Disclaimer : I don't own Naruto or Toaru Kagaku no Railgun/Toaru Majutsu no Index
The Trinity of Tokiwadai
Chapter Ninety Two: World War Three - Starfall
As Fiamma of the Right's crazy magic flying fortress flew up into the sky, Naru shot up to attack it whilst ensconced in her Jager Demon Frame. She wasn't the only one turning their attention towards it though, and practically every gun and spell, and everything in-between, that the besiegers that had encircled the Russian base which had served as the core of the flying fortress had at their disposal shot towards it. In response, its Angelic protector responded by stretching its wings to ridiculous proportions and unleashed a barrage of innumerable wickedly sharp icicle missiles at such high speeds that they resembled micro meteors.
"Holy shit! That's way too many icicles! Where did that Angel even find enough mass in those spindly wings for something like this!?" Naru complained as she used the superior maneuverability of her Jager to evade the impromptu meteor shower. A feat that she only just managed.
Magic is bullshit. Kurama said with a roll of his eyes.
Naru agreed and would have told him so, but she was distracted by seeing how the Angel's flaming, icy meteors proceeded to not only intercept everything shot at the fortress but also managed to take out the vast majority of her allies in one fell swoop.
"Captain Davy!" Naru shooted in dismay as she saw the ghost ship of the Necromancer who had ferried her across Russia crash into the ground, its hull perforated by hundreds of breaches courtesy of the deadly meteor shower that the enemy had conjured.
Naru, I think we might need to pull out the big guns for this. Kurama suggested with a wary growl as the rain of fiery ice shards finally ended and Naru could stop her evasions.
Glad we're on the same page, 'cause I was thinking the same thing. Naru sent back as she began switching out her speedy Jager for her Hexe Demon Frame. But hold back on that new Micro Phase of yours, alright? I've a feeling this fight is gonna be a long one.
You and me both. Kurama sent back in agreement even as Naru combined a swing of the lances of her Hexe with an application of Kurama's Hyper Accelerated Entropy Micro Phase to send waves of raw entropy at Fiamma's Angel.
Pulling its wings back to a more normal size, the gold-trimmed white humanoid responded by flying out of the way of the attacks with a speed and grace that left Naru envious. She might be able to match the speed with her Jager but there was no that she'd have managed to be as graceful doing it as this Angel was. Its movements were downright otherworldly in their elegance.
Though, as it closed with Naru and stabbed two of its wings ahead of it like lances at her, she quickly dismissed any thought of her opponent's beauty. Instead, she quickly brought up her Frame's own energy lances and only just barely managed to deflect the Angel's grossly elongated wings as they tried to impale her.
She had just barely managed that however when her opponent finished closing with her and landed a punch to her Frame's gut. The blow shattered Naru's Demon Frame like it was so much glass and the Number 2 only just managed to not be reduced to a pulp by pulling her human body out of the way of the blow at the last second. Even then the shockwave created by the immensely powerful blow was enough to rupture a good chunk of her internal organs. Thankfully, her regeneration immediately stepped in to fix that.
Shit! We can't get hit by that!
You don't need to tell me that! Naru shouted back even as she used her own Micro Phase, Recursive Temporal State, to trap her opponent in a time loop even as she rapidly disengaged, pulling more chakra from her body and rebuilding her wrecked Hexe Frame.
The time loop only held the Angel for a few seconds however, before with the sound of shattered glass, which Naru noticed sounded suspiciously like the sound created by Imagine Breaker when it negated something, it freed itself from the power of her Micro Phase. And the first thing it did once it was free was turn its gaze towards Naru. Its pure white eyes lacked any irises and that made its expression hard to read, but the blonde got the distinct impression that it was looking at her with angry disdain.
Naru didn't like being subjected to that look. She was the Number 2 ranked Esper damnit! One of the most powerful individuals in the whole world! No one should be looking at her like she was beneath them.
However, as the entropic wave she fired off at the Angel was swept aside with a casual wave of its wings, Naru found that maybe, just maybe, her current opponent was right to look at her like that. Maybe she really was outclassed by its power.
Naru! Dodge! Kurama shouted in warning as the winged humanoid went on the offensive once more and with a blur charged towards Naru.
The blonde had been expecting some kind of attack though and the moment there was the faintest hint of motion from her opponent, she'd switched Frames back to Jager and used its maneuverability to blur out of the way. No, not just out of the way but above the Angel. And once she was in position, she put her plan into motion by switching to Festung.
"Eat chakra, you Angelic freak!" Naru roared as she unloaded every single weapon mounted on the most heavily armed of her Demon Frames, unleashing a veritable storm of chakra beams and missiles that unerringly slammed into the Angel and sent it plummeting groundwards.
At least the damned thing still somewhat obeys the laws of Newtonian physics. Naru thought as she switched back to Hexe and chased the falling Angel's descent, firing off entropic waves at her target as she did.
Maybe. But I don't know how much that's going to help us when even after everything we've hit it with, this Angel doesn't seem to have taken a lick of damage. Kurama sent back as the cloud of smoke created by the detonation of the Festung's projectiles cleared and they could once more see their target. A target that looked pristine despite tanking a salvo that would've wrecked a whole tank battalion. Not even the entropic waves that began washing over it seemed to damage it. There wasn't even a crack in the black ice that its wings were made of!
Naru must've spent a second too long trying to search for some sign that her attacks were having an effect because she did not see the Angel move until it suddenly appeared in front of her in a blur. She would've cursed but that would've taken precious time she didn't have, so instead she just focused on staying alive.
In a move that was as daring as it was stupid, Naru evaded the deadly blow she knew was coming by dismissing her Demon Frame. The moment she did, the power that it provided to fight gravity disappeared and Naru began to fall like a stone. A fall she accelerated by manipulating the winds around her. This unorthodox move seemed to combine with the distracting wisps of chakra left behind by the abrupt dismissal of her Frame to distract the Angel enough such that Naru was able to make good her escape.
And the moment that Naru was out of its reach, she activated Jager and jetted as far away from her opponent's deadly fists as her speedy Frame could manage. Not that, in hindsight, it was truly necessary. As no sooner had Naru fell out of the Angel's reach, then a new contender entered the ring and distracted her opponent.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, a massive sword of light manifested and cut down at the Angel like a gigantic executioner's blade. An attack that prompted the humanoid creature to bring its black ice wings in front of it in a makeshift shield that somehow managed to deflect the attack even as it dodged to the side. Whatever the blade of light was, it managed to do more damage to the Angel than Naru had as it somehow managed to nick its wings. Said damage was repaired almost instantly but it was still more than anything Naru had been able to achieve.
H-How!?
Hmm… If I'd hazard a guess, based on what I'm seeing, I think that sword is able to cut through dimensions.
Wait! You can detect that kinda thing!? Naru sent back, surprised.
You can too, Naru. I'm simply basing my hypothesis on detecting the blade's passage in the higher dimensions using the same senses you use to scan them to target your teleports. That's all. Nothing special.
Oh. When you put it that way… Naru replied, blushing in embarrassment. She was the Number 2 Esper! She should've realized it was something that simple.
Desperate to distract from her awkward lapse, Naru turned towards the origin point of the dimension cutting light sword and quickly spotted the Magician, because there was no way that something like this was the work of an Esper and Naru hadn't at least heard rumors about it, responsible for creating it. This turned out to be a blonde woman in her later 20s who had tied her hair in the back and wore a red dress made out of bright red leather which gave off an impression of bondage-related clothing with an unnaturally large skirt. An ensemble that was added to with red gloves that nearly reached up to her shoulders, and a small golden crown. A woman that Naru recognized from intel briefings on the British royal family as Princess Carissa, the Second Princess of the United Kingdom.
What's one of the British royals doing here!? I know they're our allies and all but sending one of the heirs to the throne to the battlefield is unnecessarily risky, no!? Naru thought as the Angel flew down the length of Princess Carissa's light blade like a bullet, clearly intent on taking her out of the fight.
Maybe it's because of her magical talent. She did manage to do more damage to the Angel in a single attack then we did the whole time we were fighting it.
Don't remind me. Naru shot back as she rushed to intercept the Angel.
She couldn't exactly let one of the royals of one of the City's staunchest allies die on her watch. She would never hear the end of it from the Board if she did.
She was saved the effort when out of nowhere, with a leap that should have been impossible, a Magician tried to bisect the Angel with a showy and over-ornamented Western sword with a red blade, a gilded edge and a round guard. A sword that Naru recognized as Durandal, a magical artifact that channeled the destructive power of the nation of France itself into its blade.
Is that-
Yup. That's the Maiden of Versailles. Kurama confirmed as he sent Naru an image from his own memories of said secret ruler of France's picture in the Bank. A picture that matched perfectly with the young woman that was before them. She had the same unhealthily pale and sunken eyes. Her long, pale blonde hair was worn back and held in place with a headband and with part of the front plaited and tied round the back of her head. A style that was identical to that in the Bank photo.
Why, by Science, are two mortal enemies, a British princess and the ruler of France, fighting alongside each other!?
War can make strange bedfellows. Kurama replied with a shrug as they watched the Angel deflect Durandal with its wings, only for cracks to form along them as they clashed against the Magician's powerful spiritual item. Personally, I'm more curious why the two of them are so wholly underdressed for the Russian cold.
Naru just sent her partner the mental equivalent of an unimpressed look. Yes, between Princess Carissa's elaborate dress and the Maiden's splendid dress mostly made of loose white cloth, he had a point but… Seriously! Was now the time to be commenting about what they were wearing!?
Hey! We're being given a chance to take a breather. You relax your way and I'll relax in mine. Kurama shot back defensively as the Angel began crossing its wings against Durandal as the Maiden of Versailles pressed her attack.
It seemed that it wasn't just Naru's vulpine partner who was using their opponent's preoccupation with the Frenchwoman to their advantage, as Princess Carissa proceeded to use this same opportunity to begin barking orders into a radio she pulled out from a pocket of her dress. Orders that seemingly led to a barrage of surface to air missiles streaking through the air towards Fiamma of the Right's fortress.
Of course, things just couldn't be that easy and upon sensing the danger to that which it was protecting, the Angel immediately released a burst of freezing air. A blast that sent the Maiden of Versailles tumbling towards the ground and freeing it to fly up to intercept the incoming missiles.
Naru spared a second to see the Frenchwoman land safely with the help of some magic or other before shouting down at both her and Princess Carissa. "You two! Go use your authority and organize the evacuation of the wounded! I'll keep that damned Angel distracted!"
Neither of the other blondes seemed willing to accept Naru's demand but she didn't bother to listen to their objections as she shot up towards the Angel with all the speed her Jager was capable of. And as she neared her distracted opponent, Naru drew two of the swords which besides its speed characterized her current Frame.
Kurama, amp up the corrosiveness of the chakra in the blades to the absolute max! Naru ordered as she closed the final distance with their opponent, who glanced their way but dismissively turned away as it spread its wings and grossly elongated them.
Already done. Kurama informed Naru, bringing a bloodthirsty grin to her lips as she got within range.
"Omnislash!" Naru roared to hype herself up just that little bit further just as she blitzed past the Angel and unleashed her attack. An attack that consisted of her swinging the various swords of the Jager Frame at the enemy in quick succession at rapidly increasing speeds, each swing moving through the air so quickly that it sent shockwaves rippling through the air around them.
An attack that struck the Angel in the exact same moment that it fired off its own to intercept the incoming missiles. Thus even as icy meteors prematurely tore the missiles apart in large explosions that lit up the sky like miniature suns, Naru had the satisfaction of seeing her blades cutting deep into the inhuman flesh of her opponent. She had damaged the Angel at last.
Not that the damned creature even seemed to care as with the missiles dealt with and whilst ignoring Naru entirely, it shot up and towards the fortress it was protecting. Trailing behind it even with the thrusters of her Jager burning at their maximum thrust, Naru found her satisfaction melting away as she saw the injuries she caused heal right before her eyes.
I think I get why people hate fighting regenerators like me now.
The hearty chuckle that was Kurama's reply was still filling Naru's mind when she finally caught up with the Angel, just as the creature was preparing to attack a monorail that was running through parts of the fortress.
And what is that doing on a magical floating fortress!? Naru couldn't help but think even as she prepared to intervene. Whatever reason the Angel might have for attacking that monorail, Naru just knew that preventing it from doing so was the right thing to do. Stopping her opponent from achieving any of its goals was probably the smart thing to do.
Once again however, Naru was saved the need to intervene as just as she completed a switch to Hexe and was preparing to fire off an amped up entropic wave, Kazakiri Hyouka suddenly appeared out of nowhere in a new Angel Mode and literally sucker punched Fiamma's Angel and sent it flying away from the monorail it had been targeting.
"You're rocking that new look, Kazakiri-san." Naru told her bestie's sister as she looked the other City girl over. She was being totally honest too. Kazakiri-san's new Angel Mode really made her look good. With a pair of wings made of gold energy and in the shape of double helices, a similarly colored halo made out of pencil-like bits that appeared and disappeared at a rapid pace, and hair and eyes that gave off a subtle gold light, it gave Kazakiri-san an otherworldly beauty.
"Thank you, Namikaze-san." The AIM Angel replied politely as she conjured an energy sword vaguely shaped like a broadsword.
Kazakiri-san had just finished arming herself when the enemy Angel counterattacked, firing a barrage of its flaming ice meteors at them.
"I've got this covered, Kazakiri-san." Naru assured her battle partner as she fired off an entropic wave that negated the incoming attack.
"Call me Hyouka, Namikaze-san. You're one of Onee-sama's best friends and we're fighting a life or death battle together, it's only fair." Kazakiri- No, Hyouka-san replied as she shot forward in a beam of light and tried to bisect the other Angel with her energy sword.
Said enemy managed to bring its right arm up to block the slash and all Hyouka-san managed was to have her blade cut deeply into the inhuman flesh and get stuck there. This should've left her open to the punch that the other Angel tried to land on her with its left arm, but Hyouka-san just released her grip on her sword, dismissed it and kicked her surprised opponent as she leapt away.
"Then feel free to call me Naru in return, Hyouka-san." Naru said as she followed up the AIM Angel's attack with an amped up entropic wave.
The enemy defiantly weathered the attack like it had Naru's previous uses of Kurama's Micro Phase on it, but this time was different. Kurama had amped up the wave as much as he could without it crossing over into his new, as yet unnamed, upgraded version. And with its power that jacked up, it finally seemed to get past whatever bullshit defense the Angel had and managed to cause its skin all across its body to discolor slightly.
It lasted only a moment and was healed almost immediately but the injury seemed to severely piss their enemy off if the look of bloody murder it shot Naru was any indication. An intent it acted upon by blurring towards Naru.
The blonde had been expecting the attack this time however and simply teleported out of the way. This surprised the Angel for a second and that was all the time that Hyouka-san needed to conjure a new sword and swing it down at the enemy, releasing a massive, skyscraper sized beam of energy along with the slash that sent it flying.
"Did we-"
"No, not yet. I really wish I could use my Authority outside the City. If I could I could just negate this An-" Hyouka-san replied as she dodged out of the way of the punch the enemy had aimed at her stomach as it blurred in front of where she was. The AIM Angel was however not able to evade the enemy's wings as they lashed out at her, though she did manage to bring her sword up in time to block them and prevent them from skewering her.
Naru rushed in to help, firing off waves of entropy at the enemy. But it seemed to have predicted she would do this and moving with the elegant grace that Naru still couldn't help but admire, weaved around her attacks and closed with her. Not that Naru let her, as just before the Angel got within strike range, she teleported away to safety.
The enemy seemed to expect that however and had spread its wings wide to unleash a salvo of its icy meteors but just as it was about to, a massive salvo of particle beams slammed into it from below. Beams with enough combined mass behind them that it sent the Angel tumbling through the air. A turn of events that Hyouka-san eagerly exploited. Conjuring a second energy sword for her free hand, she swung both blades and released a beam with each slash. Twin beams of raw destruction that promptly proceeded to shear the enemy's wings down to size.
Taking a second to confirm that the enemy was recovering and so indisposed, Naru chanced a look at the source of the unexpected beam barrage and couldn't help the broad smile that spread across her face as she saw who it was. Flying up towards the fight on a pair of beautiful wings decorated by rainbow feathers and with a prismatic halo hovering over her head was none other than Naru's bestie, Saten Ruiko.
"Onee-sama!" "Rui-chan!" Hyouka and Naru-chan greeted Ruiko enthusiastically as she joined them in the fight against the Archangel Gabriel.
"Hi, Hyouka, Naru-chan." Ruiko replied with a wave even as she spread her wings and proceeded to fire thousands of pencil thin lasers from each of her feathers that curved through the sky in chaotic patterns as they zeroed in on Gabriel.
The Archangel responded by curling its wings around itself to create a protective cocoon when it became clear that it was unable to evade Ruiko's attack. Her lasers slammed into the black ice of its wings, heating them up but unable to penetrate. But that was only the beginning of its suffering as Hyouka immediately followed up Ruiko's lasers by merging her two energy swords into a single oversized blade that she proceeded to swing at Gabriel, unleashing its full charge as a massive beam that proceeded to sublimate away the entirety of the ice that made up the Archangel's wings.
"Naru-chan!" "Naru-san!" Ruiko and Hyouka shouted in unison at the Number 2, finally prompting the [Maniforce] to join in the follow up by firing off an entropic wave at Gabriel.
It was a little too late however as in the seconds before Naru conjured her wave and in the few more seconds that it took to reach it, the Archangel had managed to conjure a new set of wings that it promptly used to shield itself against the attack, even as it dove out of the way. A turn of events that had Ruiko and Hyouka groaning in disappointment at the wasted opportunity.
"Sorry!" Naru-chan apologized as her, Ruiko and Hyouka unleashed a barrage of entropic waves, varied particle beams, and crescent shaped projectiles of raw, destructive AIM respectively at Gabriel. "I didn't realize you were expecting me to follow up your attacks."
"It's alright, Naru-chan. Just be more on the ball going forward." Ruiko assuaged her friend even as the Archangel gracefully evaded every attack that they threw at it and began forming three superdense javelins of black ice in a equidistant triangle around it, which when they were complete, it proceeded to launch at them.
Naru-chan was the nearest to the Archangel and enshrouded in flames created by the sheer speed of its passing, the frozen javelin thrown her way reached her first and prompted the blonde to teleport away. However, despite that the missile was unfazed and simply proceeded to change its path as it once more homed in on its target.
"Naru-chan! You can't evade it. You need to destroy it." Ruiko shouted at her friend as she spread her wings wide and tapped into the mysterious power granted to her by her Angel Mode to gather together a ball of displaced timespace that she promptly threw into the path of the javelin that was targeting her. A sphere of distorted reality that upon contact with the incoming projectile transported the deadly missile away into the Imaginary Number District where it was rendered inert.
I really wish I could do that to Gabriel itself to be honest. Ruiko thought with a frown. Of course that was wishful thinking at best. Not only did she doubt she could even transport the Archangel like that, even if she could, she did not want to risk the monster gaining access to the Imaginary Number District where it could cause untold damage to it and the AIM fields of the Esper of which the Phase was collectively a manifestation.
At the same time as Ruiko was pondering the matter, Hyouka intercepted the javelin that Gabriel had thrown at her with a lance of destructive AIM energy of her own. This left only Naru-chan having to deal with her own. Something she promptly did with a powerful entropic wave.
"Right! I didn't expect it to be a homing attack!" Naru-chan shouted back apologetically.
"Don't take the risk! Treat all of Gabriel's attacks as being capable of it." Ruiko replied as she shot back at high speed from the Archangel as it blurred in front of her whilst attempting to impale her with a lance of black ice that it had conjured. Even with her swift reaction, she only barely evaded it and would likely have been run through if Hyouka had not promptly blitzed in between her and Gabriel whilst swinging a freshly conjured energy sword between them. The sudden move visibly startled the Archangel and forced it back, just barely evading the follow up slash and subsequent energy beam that Hyouka shot at it.
And whilst it was distracted by Hyouka, Ruiko teleported behind the Archangel, stretched out her wings to their fullest extent once more and fired off beams of raw AIM from each of her feathers. Beams that she proceeded to have wrap around Gabriel, restraining the Archangel in a seemingly rainbow cocoon. A restrained Archangel that was promptly subjected to a massive beam of raw AIM that Hyouka unleashed at it.
"Science! You two are super in-sync!" Naru-chan gasped in surprise as she tried to follow-up with a wave of entropy of her own, only for it to sweep across empty air as a visibly injured but rapidly regenerating Archangel flew out of the way in a blur.
"Of course we are, Naru-san. Onee-sama and I are sisters." Hyouka said with a huff as she conjured a bow and proceeded to fire a barrage of raw AIM arrows at Gabriel, which gracefully evaded every single one of the projectiles.
"Yeah, Naru-chan." Ruiko replied with a shake of her head as she fired off her own barrage of raw AIM arrows at the enemy, which was as equally ineffective as Hyouka's. "It's no surprise that sisters would be in-sync."
"Um. That makes sense I guess." Naru-chan replied as she lobbed balls of white fire to join the arrow barrage fired at it by Hyouka and her, even as it just continued to gracefully evade everything they threw at it but otherwise not retaliating. "Uh, just curious here, but you wouldn't happen to know what is this Angel that we're fighting, do you? I think Arisa told me earlier but in the chaos, I forgot."
"Yeah. It's the Archangel Gabriel." Ruiko informed the Number 2 as the aforementioned famous Christian Angel finally went on the counterattack and finally began firing flaming icicles at them that prompted all three of them to jump into evasions. "Fiamma summoned it as part of his ritual to change the world."
"Yeah? Change it into what exactly?" Naru asked as he teleported behind Gabriel and performed an x-shaped slash whilst unleashing an especially powerful entropic wave point blank at the creature's face. "And how do you know any of this when you've been out of the loop since your boyfriend snatched you out of your own house and took you on a trip across wintry Russia?"
"Apparently he wants to restore stability to the world that was destabilized by the City's experiments." Ruiko replied with a shrug as she fired a beam of demolecularization energy at the injured but regenerating Archangel. "And I know because your boss mentioned it when he called me earlier."
"Huh? Why would my boss do that? He's not usually so forthcoming with information." Naru replied with suspicion as they both watched as Hyouka blurred in front of the disorientated and battered Archangel and began attempting to cut it into pieces with a pair of conjured energy swords. Attempted being the operative word there since Gabriel responded by conjuring a pair of twin black ice swords of its own and proceeded to engage her in a deadly sword dance. Not that the crossing of blades stopped Hyouka from joining the conversation.
"He told her all that to convince Onee-sama to join the fight against Fiamma and Gabriel." Hyouka piped up as she tried but failed to break through Gabriel's formidable guard.
Naru-chan frowned and nodded in understanding, before sharply turning towards Ruiko. "Okay, important question here. Are you going to suddenly black out on us? 'Cos if you are, then it'll be better if you sit out this fight."
"No need to worry about that. My girls fixed that." Ruiko replied as she fired off a barrage of AIM arrows to destroy sections of Gabriel's wings that it had tried to arch behind Hyouka and impale her from the back.
"Order-chan, Janie-chan, and Febrie-chan?" Naru-chan said, sounding both surprised and happy as she teleported behind the heavily engaged Gabriel and tried to stab it with her Hexe Frame's twin lances. Unfortunately the Archangel seemed to sense her arrival, probably by somehow detecting her movement through the higher dimensions and dove to the side, disengaging from both her and Hyouka.
"Yes, Naru-chan." Ruiko replied with a sigh, exasperated at how easily distracted her friend could be. All whilst she blurred towards the Archangel, unwilling to let it fully disengage from the fight, conjuring a pair of broadswords forged of AIM energy as she did and wielding them like a pair of scissors that she tried to use to cut it in half. "I'll explain everything later but for now, could we focus on fighting Gabriel?"
"Right! Sorry." Naru replied apologetically once again acting like a certain unflattering blonde stereotype, something that she seemed to be doing quite a lot in the last few minutes. Though Ruiko quickly dismissed the observation, too preoccupied with focusing on teleporting away from Gabriel as it tucked it legs up to its chest, escaping her blades, and used them to lash out at her in a kick that she knew, even with her body reinforced by the power of her Angel Mode, would've shattered her ribs if it connected.
As she rematerialized, Ruiko suddenly found the sky filled with anti-aircraft fire, magical effects and every attack in between as the forces on the ground, seemingly having recovered from Gabriel's initial attack, joined the fight by unleashing everything they had at the Archangel and Fiamma's Star of Bethlehem that it was defending.
"Darn idiots! You're just making yourselves targets!" Naru cursed as she teleported in close to Gabriel in a bid to prevent its inevitable counterattack on the ground forces, only for the Archangel to shoot skyward as the blonde materialized whilst its wings began to grow rapidly.
Hyouka and Ruiko tried to intercept it next with Ruiko firing beams from her feathers in a bid to restrain it whilst Hyouka tried to shoot a beam of AIM energy at it. The Archangel just gracefully flew around both their efforts however and escaped their attack range. Once it had, it spread its wings wide and fired another one of its meteor showers from its grossly extended wings. Meteors that proceeded to decimate the ranks of the forces on the ground below, silencing their offensive once more.
"Hey Princess Carissa, Maiden of Versailles! I know you two are down there, you idiots!" Naru shouted down at the devastated ranks of their allies down below, using her chakra to imitate Aero Hand and boost the volume of her voice. "Didn't you listen to what I said!? Stay out of this! Focus on getting the dead and injured out of there! Leave Gabriel to us!"
"You'll think they'll listen, Naru-san?" Hyouka asked as she crossed a pair of conjured energy swords in front of her and blocked the wicked black ice rapier that Gabriel swung at her in an overhead slash as it blurred in front of her.
"They better." Naru-chan growled as she gathered spiraling winds around one of her lances that she proceeded to launch as a horizontal twister at Gabriel, forcing it back from Hyouka as it brought its sword in a guard in front of itself to defend against it.
"Let's hope they do." Ruiko added as she teleported behind the Archangel and tried to zap it with the most powerful lightning bolt she could gather. She wasn't Mikoto-senpai but she could emulate Electromastery well enough to imitate a bolt in the middle of the range of her fellow Level 5's capabilities. A bolt with enough power to incinerate a whole battalion worth of infantry.
Yet, despite that Gabriel just seemed annoyed by her effort and turning towards her with an unimpressed look, tried to swipe at her with its wings. A counterattack that Ruiko had to engage in a hasty teleport to escape.
When she rematerialized a moment later, she found Naru attempting to trap Gabriel in a shrinking cage of spiraling winds. Winds that were streaming in from every direction and compressing into an ever denser sphere. A move that reminded Ruiko of a particular memorable move that Accel had attempted during the Level Six Shift.
"Rui-chan! Light it up!"
"Got it!" Ruiko shouted back as she proceeded to activate every gravity manipulation ability in her catalog of emulated Esper powers and applied it to the sphere of air that Naru had created around Gabriel. The effect of which proceeded to compress the air so fast and with such force that it proceeded to ignite the gasses in the air that Naru-chan had collected, creating a micro sun.
In response, Gabriel proceeded to try to escape the ball of plasma that it had become trapped in but Hyouka would not let it. Blurring forward and buzzing around the mini star like a deranged hummingbird, she intercepted the Archangel's every attempt by blasting it back into its fiery prison with well placed energy beams. Though even as her sister did so, Ruiko also noticed how she was gathering together a formidable amount of AIM energy.
"You think it'll be enough to take it out?" Naru asked hopefully.
"Somehow I doubt it." Ruiko admitted.
Sadly, she had barely finished the frank assessment when she was proven correct as in a flash of blinding light, the entirety of the mini sun was promptly frozen solid. Said icy prison promptly began falling to earth but it had barely dropped ten feet when with a massive flex of Gabriel's wings, the icy star shattered and freed the Archangel. However, its escape coincided with the completion of Hyouka's preparations for her own attack.
An attack that took the form of a massive sphere of raw destruction that she made out of the AIM energy she had been gathering which she promptly proceeded to throw at the inhuman Angel. A sphere that consumed the already injured Gabriel, with its blackened skin, in its bright gold glow.
"Okay? Is that gonna do it then?"
"We can only hope." Hyouka said as she floated over to join Ruiko and Naru-chan.
For her part, Ruiko just shook her head. She was not one for false hope.
A realism that was rewarded when Hyouka's sphere of destruction blinked out and left a battered Gabriel in its wake. Its wings were all but gone, with the stumps that remained chipped, cracked, and visibly disintegrating. Its skin was blackened and parts of its body were outright missing, having been destroyed by Hyouka's efforts. But despite all that, the Archangel Gabriel had survived.
And worryingly was already regenerating its injuries in a grotesque display that saw its skin knit back together as if all the damage was going in reverse. Limbs grew back, skin cleared up and returned the Angel to its pristine appearance.
Suddenly, Gabriel turned its head in a wholly unexpected direction. A move that left it open to a blast of hurricane force winds that Naru blew its way that sent it tumbling through the air for a moment as it stabilized its flight. But throughout that whole spin through the air, it never once looked away from the direction it had turned. Not even as Hyouka teleported in front of it to engage it in an exchange of blades and its distraction resulted in it accruing a sizable collection of deep cuts.
Knowing whatever had so captured the Archangel's attention must be important, Ruiko followed its example and turned her focus in the direction that had so captured Gabriel's attention. A direction that she realized with a frown led directly back to Elizalina Alliance base where she had left her family and more immediately at a souped up car that was speeding across the snowy Russian wilderness towards the battlefield at unsafe speeds. A car that her AIM sense informed her contained none other than her boyfriend, Accel!
What does he think he's doing!? Ruiko thought with dismay even as she teleported in between Gabriel and the aforementioned car and raised a multilayered barrier that just barely managed to hold against the meteor shower that the Archangel launched at the vehicle with a flex of its black ice wings.
"Accel! Get out of there!" Ruiko shouted at the top of her lungs and used her audiokinesis to project her voice towards her boyfriend so he could hear her despite the significant distance between them. At the same time, she conjured a fresh multilayered barrier to shield herself and his car, all whilst Naru-chan and Hyouka engaged Gabriel and tried to turn its attention away.
'Tried' being the operative word here as their efforts were in vain as the Archangel easily fended off their attacks by conjuring a wall of ice that blocked the white hot fireball Naru-chan spat at it and shot a lance of ice from one of its wings to intercept Hyouka's own energy javelin. Through all that, its head never turned away from Accel's approaching car as it cupped its hands in front of itself, focused its power and conjured a single arrow sized dart of black ice that was denser than anything it had created so far and was permeated with more of the Telesma energy that Christian Angels, like itself, used to power themselves than it had used the whole fight put together. A projectile that once launched tore through the layers of Ruiko's barrier like a hot knife through butter.
In the face of that, Ruiko should have teleported away or otherwise evaded. However, if she did that then the dart would have sailed unimpeded towards Accel! And as powerful as his Redirection was, with the enormous amounts of Telesma that had been infused into the dart, she had doubts it would be sufficient to deflect it. Thus, she did the only thing she could do in this situation, foolish though it was, and threw herself into its path in a desperate bid to bodily shield her boyfriend.
"Rui-chan!" "Onee-sama!" Naru-chan and Hyouka shouted in alarm and prepared to intervene but she ignored them. Even with her superhuman speed, her sister wouldn't get to her in time. And Naru-chan could not complete the computations for a teleport in time either.
Her fate thus seemed sealed. However, some higher power must have been smiling down upon her because in a shout that must have been amplified by his power, the familiar voice of her aforementioned boyfriend boomed around her and drowned out Naru-chan and Hyouka's desperate cries.
"Ruiko, you idiot!" The pseudo albino all but screamed as a lance of super compressed plasma shot up from the direction of his car and slammed into Gabriel's dart seconds before it would have pierced Ruiko, deflecting it.
Both Naru-chan and Hyouka breathed a sigh of relief even as they dove into a close quarters melee with the Archangel, distracting it as Ruiko turned to greet the newest arrival onto the battlefield.
"Accel," Ruiko said in a mix of gratitude for him saving her and frustration at him putting her in the situation where she needed saving in the first place. "What are you doing here?"
"Saving you apparently." Accel replied as he flew towards her at high speed on the black feathered and tornado wings of his Angel Mode. A speed that should have distorted his voice but which careful use of his vector control, he accounted for and countered. "What the hell do you think you were doing throwing yourself in front of an attack like that!?"
"Trying to save you." Ruiko said with a shrug before gesturing at the car far below which now driverless had crashed into a tree just short of the battered camps that made up the siege line which had been surrounding Fiamma's stronghold before he'd transformed it into the Star of Bethlehem. "And answer my question, what are you doing here? I asked you to take care of Kaa-san and our girls."
"Like hell I'm gonna stand back and play babysitter whilst you're off fighting for your life." Accel shot back even as they combined their powers to create a wall of swirling air that deflected a meteor barrage that Gabriel managed to fire in their direction despite Naru-chan and Hyouka's best efforts to contain it.
"Can you two talk later? Can't you see we're in the middle of a fight here!? Or at least, I dunno, talk and fight? You know, like we were doing earlier!?" Naru-chan shouted at Ruiko and Accel in frustration even as she managed to restrain Gabriel with some vortices of wind around its limbs, giving Hyouka the opening to blast it with a beam of destructive AIM energy.
"Yes, Onee-sama! Please don't take too long scolding Accelerator-sama." Hyouka added as she was forced to duck under an attempt by Gabriel to land a straight punch to her head after it had broken out of Naru's hold through sheer brute strength and blurred right in front of her sister.
"Just hold it off a little longer. Accel and I will join you soon. We just need a minute or two to talk about something important." Ruiko shouted back to the two and turned back to her boyfriend, barely catching out of the corner of her eye how Hyouka counterattacked by hitting the Archangel with a haymaker that sent it reeling back.
"That's sweet, Accel." Ruiko told her boyfriend as if their conversation had not been interrupted. "But if you're here, who's protecting Kaa-san and our girls?"
"That Frenda girl is there. Plus a whole army's worth of Maniple." Accel said with a shrug as both his hands and his tornado wings twitched in a show of how much he wanted to join the fight. He wisely held back though. If he did attack Gabriel now, there was little doubt that the Archangel would turn its full attention towards them and then they would likely not be able to finish this conversation. "I thought that was more than enough firepower to keep them safe."
"I suppose it is…" Ruiko allowed with a frown on her face. If Fiamma or someone else had another ace up their sleeve like Gabriel, then there was nothing Frenda-chan and Maniple could do against it. Nothing less than someone with an Angel Mode or equivalent could stand against something on the power level of an Angel. That said… The likelihood of anyone possessing something like that on this battlefield and would choose to turn it against her family was slim to none. In light of that, Accel's decision was a sound one.
"Are you two done!?" Naru-chan shouted in exasperation as she hurtled past them whilst desperately using the lances of her Hexe Frame to block the conjured black ice rapier that Gabriel was wielding as it tried to break the blonde's guard and presumably following that, use to eviscerate her.
"Yes, Onee-sama, Accelerator-sama, are you?" Hyouka asked as she exploited the Archangel's split second of confusion as the Number 2 teleported away to attack it from above with a massive energy beam she unleashed by swinging the two energy swords she was wielding. "Watching you two be a couple is cute and all, but this isn't the time. We shouldn't be getting distracted right now."
Ruiko sighed. Her sister had a point.
I'll just have to scold him later then. The [AIM Sovereign] concluded as she just glanced at Accel and nodded.
In response, a bloodthirsty grin spread across her boyfriend's face and he launched himself at Gabriel.
It's like I just let a war dog off its leash. Ruiko thought with a bemused shake of her head as Accel sent his tornado wings spearing forward to impale the Archangel, only to have it, in defiance of physics, use its own Telesma infused wings to deflect them. Not that the impossible move dissuaded the Number 1 in any way. If anything, the prospect of fighting something that defied mortal comprehension seemed to hype him up. At least that's the impression Ruiko got from Accel's excited laughter as he began firing beams of darkness at Gabriel from his feathered wings.
Accel's enthusiasm sadly did not yield results however as the Archangel acted with the divine grace as befit an agent of Heaven and easily flew around all his attacks. Not even the supporting fire from Naru-chan and Hyouka, in the form of entropic waves and AIM energy arrows, that tried to brace it in place helped.
Hmm… I think it's time to try something different.
"Hyouka, come help me with something." Ruiko shouted at her sister.
"What do you have in mind, Onee-sama?" Hyouka asked as without hesitation, she abandoned her assault and flew over.
As she did, Ruiko took a moment to see that Accel and Naru-chan had responded to her hinting that she had a plan by intensifying their attempts to trap Gabriel in place in a hope to make it easy for whatever she had in mind to land a hit.
They know me so well. Ruiko thought with a smile as she turned to Hyouka. "Can you sync with my AIM Field and help me manifest a particular ability I have in mind? I can't manage it on my own."
"Of course," Hyouka agreed with a nod as she used her unique nature as an amalgam of the AIM Fields of all Espers to sync with Ruiko's own, only for her eyes to widen in shock as she realized whose AIM her sister was trying to emulate. "T-This i-is-"
"Yes." Ruiko said with a nod of her own. "Can you do it?"
"Working together, we should." Hyouka replied, biting her lips hesitantly. "Are you sure?"
"We have to give it a try." Ruiko said, gesturing at how Accel and Naru-chan were desperately evading a meteor storm launched by Gabriel whilst simultaneously futilely trying to counterattack with an elemental storm and attempts to maul the Archangel with the claws he had transformed his tornado wings into respectively. "We're not getting anywhere with everything else we've tried."
"Right." Hyouka said as she offered Ruiko a hand that she promptly grasped and proceeded to sync their AIM Fields.
As they did, they began combining their efforts to begin manifesting the AIM Field of Shundan Kimi. Normally, doing so was beyond either of them. Ruiko was capable of performing the computations to support its use but despite her unrivaled ability among Espers to manipulate AIM via her ability, AIM Sovereign, she was unable to emulate a sufficiently stable Personal Reality to manifest the other Esper's ability in a form with any utility. In contrast, Hyouka, who was essentially a being of pure AIM, had a superhuman, instinctive ability to shape AIM Fields that allowed her to generate the required Personal Reality but did not possess the required computational ability to effectively use the ability even if she did. Sadly, for all that she was a manifestation of the City's Espers, Hyouka was largely limited to manifesting their AIM as raw energy and what strange, esoteric powers her nature as an Angel of Science granted her. Together however, Ruiko and Hyouka were more than up to the task of manifesting Shundan's ability.
Thus, it was in a dramatic demonstration of sisterly cooperation that a tiny black hole manifested directly in front of Gabriel. Immediately caught in the powerful pull of the singularity, the Archangel was sucked into the artificially distorted region of spacetime and its body began being torn apart by the incredible gravitic forces unleashed upon it. Accel and Naru-chan would've been caught in the pull of the conjured black hole too but the former simply teleported out of the area of effect whilst Accel used the full might of his vector manipulation to counter its effects as he pulled away at full speed.
"You two threw a black hole at it!?" Naru shouted as she teleported beside Ruiko and Hyouka.
"Yes," Ruiko replied with a smirk as the three of them watched as Gabriel was literally torn apart by the black hole.
"You're killing it, Ruiko." Accel said as he flew over to join them in watching the pleasant scene.
"Did you forget about my part in this, Accelerator-sama?" Hyouka asked, shooting Accel a pout.
Ruiko's pseudo albino knight would have ignored her sister but Ruiko shot him a warning glare and with a gulp, he quickly relented. "Right. You're doing a good job too, Hyouka-san."
"Thank you, Accelerator-sama." Hyouka said, offering her future brother-in-law a pleased smile.
"Uh, guys! Watch out, I think Gabriel's about to break free." Naru shouted in warning as she gestured at the Archangel who had conjured a massive black ice lance, one brimming with Telesma, that it proceeded to stab into the black hole. A move that proceeded to transfer untold amounts of the energy of Heaven into the singularity, smothering it. But not without a titanic explosion that unleashed not only tremendous kinetic force but also immense amounts of deadly radiation.
"Accel! Naru-chan!" Ruiko shouted at her boyfriend and her friend, prompting them to launch themselves at Gabriel intent on keeping the badly injured Archangel off balance.
"Hyouka, with me!" Ruiko shouted unnecessarily as they watched Accel and Naru-chan engage the injured Archangel. However, despite missing a good chunk of its left side that had been closest to the black hole, Gabriel continued to put up an annoyingly good fight. Enough that it not only was not taken out by their attempts but was keeping ahead of their attacks enough that it was able to heal with its grotesque regeneration.
"Already on it, Onee-sama." Hyouka replied as without releasing her hand, her sister assisted Ruiko in using a wide variety of different powers to collect the energies and exotic particles that had been unleashed by the violently detonated black hole. Energies that they gathered together into a single lance of raw destructive energy.
A lance that they released on Gabriel as Naru-chan disorientated it with a wind blast and Accel kept it from recovering by slamming the massive fists that he had transformed his tornado wings into him from either side, effectively boxing its ears writ large. The immensely powerful energies that Ruiko and Hyouka gathered slammed into the Archangel with a force of a veritable supernova, sending it crashing earthward.
It tried to recover, but Accel wasn't about to let it.
"Oh! Don't even try it, you shitty Angel!" He shouted as he clasped his two fists shaped tornado wings together and slammed it down on Gabriel in a powerful blow. A blow that was powerful enough that it thwarted its attempts to recover and like one of the meteors that it used so much, it crashed to the ground with an earth shaking impact that threw up a massive cloud of dust.
"Think that's enough to take it out at last!?" Naru-chan asked tiredly.
"I hope so." Hyouka said as with a tired sigh, she released Ruiko's hand and their AIM Fields desynced.
"Somehow I doubt it." Accel said as he pointed skyward as the day suddenly turned to night and the stars it revealed began to move unnaturally as they arranged themselves into blue magic circles, some of which turned red and from which innumerable arrows of fire, each overflowing with Telesma that put almost all of Gabriel's previous attacks to shame, began raining down.
"Evade! That's the God's Purge spell. We can't tank it!" Accel shouted as they all heeded his panicked call and began to rapidly engage in evasive maneuvers.
"God's Purge? How do you even know about the spell? Much less its name!?" Naru-chan shouted in shock as she, like Ruiko herself, engaged in a rapid series of evasive teleports.
"You deciphered the details from those parchments?"
"Yup. I did, Ruiko." Accel confirmed.
"How does that help us now!?" Hyouka shouted in dismay as she failed her latest evasion and she was struck by one of the fire arrows, sending her crashing to earth.
"Hyouka!" Ruiko shouted in worry, distracting her and slowing her teleportation. She would've been hit but Accel reached out with one of his tornado wings and pulled her out of the way.
Sadly his rescue might have saved her from the first hit, but the distraction it produced for him just left them both open to being hit by another pair of fire arrows. Blows that sent both of them crashing earthward like Hyouka.
Of them, Naru-chan fared the best. Using her Recursive Temporal State to tactically deploy time loops to save her from hits, she managed to evade the barrage the best. However, even she could not escape the hundreds of fire arrows that Gabriel directed her way, overwhelming her ability to use her Micro Phase and landing a hit, sending her to join them all in craters on the crowd.
"Argh! Why am I not surprised that it has an upgraded version of that annoying meteor attack it likes so much!?" Naru-chan asked through gritted teeth as she pushed herself to her feet and using the anti-gravity effect of her Hexe Frame, floated out of her crater.
"Considering the similarity in its effect but the much higher level of Telesma that are in those arrows, you're essentially correct in that it's an upgraded version of its base meteor attack, Naru-chan." Ruiko said as she allowed Accel to lift her out of their crater in a princess carry. "Hyouka, you okay?"
Her sister who was floating above her own impact crater nearby just nodded distractedly and pointed skyward. Frowning, Ruiko followed her lead and paled slightly as she saw Gabriel floating above and glaring down at them imperiously as the blue magic circles that it had conjured in the sky shifted once more, as it clearly prepared to fire a second wave of its God's Purge.
"Not so fast, Archangel Gabriel! Whether you are controlled by Fiamma or not, I will not allow you to continue to abuse the power of Heaven to enact his will. This blasphemy must end!" A voice, that Ruiko's encyclopedic mind recognized as belonging to Acqua of the Back, declared unnaturally from a great distance away.
Turning towards it, alongside all but Accel who kept his attention on Gabriel, they saw the Magician surrounded by a pillar of transparent blue Telesma. Telesma that he was draining from the Archangel and a process which, as she glanced skyward, Ruiko noted with pleasant surprise disrupted the Archangel's God's Purge, slowly causing the forming flaming arrows to disperse and the blue magic circles that had helped conjure them which it had filled the sky with to disappear, the stars that had made them moving back into their natural positions.
Ruiko did not know the mechanics behind Acqua of the Back's spell, she was hardly an expert on magic, but it probably had something to do with his alignment with the Archangel. Nor did she know why he had turned on his erstwhile comrade beyond what she could gleam from his declaration. But however he managed it or why, she appreciated his contribution to the fight.
Thus as she flew up into the sky alongside Accel, Hyouka and Naru-chan, she took the effort to use her audiokinesis to offer the Magician her thanks.
"Thank you, Acqua of the Back." She told the man as she fired off a salvo of particle beams from her feathered wings to add to the barrage the others sent Gabriel's way as the fight was rejoined.
Mikoto bit her lip worriedly, fingers digging into the armrest of her chair. Her worry wasn't born out of fear of flying or something like that, the reason for her fears were more complicated than that. And as the plane reentered the atmosphere over the combat zone in Russia? Her fears accelerated as they cleared the clouds and she looked at what was happening outside.
It was something otherworldly to her. Even after fighting demons and such in Academy City, the entity known as Gabriel just radiated might and power. So much of it that it was suffocating. And she had just admitted that when the angel unleashed a burst of light that almost blinded them even from the distance they were at!
"What happened? How is everyone!?" Mikoto barked in shock.
"I don't know," Kazari said hastily. "Our sensors are still blinded by that blast."
Deciding enough was enough, Mikoto turned to Kuroko with a firm look on her face.
"Get me down there and get out, just like we promised."
"But Onee-sama-" Her friend tried to argue, but Mikoto cut her off sternly.
"No buts! You promised. Besides, someone has to keep Kazari safe."
Biting her lip, Kuroko could only nod and took her hand. And with a blink, the two were outside of the plane. The biting cold was harsh as the freezing winds lashed out at them, but Kuroko's next few teleports across the battlefield saved them from the frigid upper atmosphere air. Not that Mikoto was concerned about that, not when the battle that had captured her attention had degenerated into pure chaos as everyone was throwing whatever they could at Gabriel, as the data Kazari had been able to dig out about the Angel from the Bank named it, in some slim hope of destroying the Angel whilst it retaliated with projectiles it shaped out of black ice that it had seemingly created out of nowhere.
"Kuroko." She said, reminding her friend of her promise once she was teleported onto the ground.
Her kohai looked reluctant, but nodded and was gone in another blink.
Now it was time to lend a hand against Heaven it seemed. And she was ready to do that in style!
It was with that thought in mind that she fished out one of the Dark Matter coins that Ruiko had supplied her and she took aim at the Archangel as it fought against the others. And lining up a shot, she poured all her worry for her friends that had built since the start of this World War 3 nonsense into her efforts and let the coin fly. Her 100% charged railgun shot through the air whilst leaving a trail of superheated plasma created by its passing before slamming into Gabriel.
However, it did not do so unnoticed. Somehow, the Archangel had sensed her incoming attack and a moment before it would've struck, it wrapped its wings around its body. This cocoon of ice, again, somehow managed to successfully shield it from the blow. Yes, the ice that made it up shattered from the strike but it nevertheless did its job of shielding it from what should've been a deadly blow.
"Hi, Mikoto-senpai." "About time you got here, Senpai!" Her two kohai and fellow members of the Trinity shouted at her in greeting.
"Yes, hello, Mikoto-sama." Kazakiri-san said as she flew down beside Mikoto whilst Accel, ignoring her entirely, proceeded to attack Gabriel to press the advantage created by the destruction of its wings. "Though, question. How did your railgun manage to damage Gabriel like that? I mean, we've been throwing around attacks with a lot more firepower than that and we've had to struggle to deal anywhere near that kind of damage."
"It's because her railgun has a high penetrative attribute according to the magic that this damned Angel operates under which gives it an advantage against it." Accelerator, of all people, explained as he was pushed back by a brace of black ice javelins that it shot at him.
"Yes, so let's take advantage of that." Naru shouted as she unleashed a massive downdraft at Gabriel, forcing it towards the ground and more importantly into Mikoto's sights. Something that Mikoto immediately backed up by firing off yet another railgun, dealing a blow that blasted through the Archangel's once more last minute attempt to defend itself by wrapping its wings around itself.
In the wake of that, Ruiko took her turn to surge forward to press the advantage. Conjuring together a significant amount of plasma, she unleashed a massive plasma beam at Gabriel. A beam that proceeded to blacken the Archangel's skin and leave it vulnerable as Hyouka unleashed a barrage of gold energy arrows that detonated against the weakened armored skin, blasting it and large chunks of Gabriel's body apart. As if that was not enough, Accelerator added to its misery by shifting his pair of tornado wings into lances that he promptly used to impale it through the shoulders, where their spiraling winds proceeded to rip the Archangel's arms clean off.
Did we win? Mikoto thought hopefully.
"Watch out! Flash freeze incoming!" Naru shouted in warning just as Gabriel released a brilliant burst of light and when Mikoto finished blinking the stars out of her eyes, she saw that a huge chunk of the sky around the Archangel had been frozen solid. A veritable glacier that was floating unnaturally in the sky. One that by its size was something that Accelerator, Naru, and Ruiko had only just barely managed to avoid becoming frozen within it.
"What? What's it doing?" Mikoto asked, blinking in confusion at the Archangel's latest move.
"It's healing." Kazakiri-san said as she flew up into the sky, throwing conjured energy lances at the ice block, blasting it apart. An effort that Accelerator was also actively engaged in as well, thanks to attempting to rip into it with the claws that he had shaped his tornado wings into whilst simultaneously firing beams of darkness from his feathered wings. Ruiko and Naru were likewise working hard to do the same with the former firing rainbow colored lasers from her wings and Naru throwing balls of white flames at the floating glacier.
Mikoto had fished out a Dark Matter coin and prepared to fire off a railgun. However, before she could launch her shot, the glacier was hit by a barrage of low yield railguns. Despite her surprise, Mikoto fired off her railgun, dealing a decisive blow that shattered Gabriel's protective glacial shield but also revealing the Archangel had bought sufficient time with it to allow it to successfully heal itself, leaving it as pristine as when the fight began. A sight that had Mikoto wincing.
"Do not worry, Onee-sama. Misaka offers in encouragement." Neko-chan's familiar voice said through her Super Kuro as the Black Crow-style tricycle Mobile Weapon came to a stop next to where Mikoto was standing.
"Neko-chan!? What are you doing here!?"
"The Council of Misakas of Academy City are here in Russia with our sisters in the country to assist in the fight against Fiamma of the Right. Misaka explains." Military Otaku said as she leapt down from the side of a tank she had apparently been riding in as said tank came to a stop next to the Super Kuro.
"The whole Council is here?" Mikoto asked, stunned at how fast they arrived.
Otaku nodded and gestured at the bunch of tanks, Russian in origin if Mikoto's poor understanding of such things were correct, which were coming to a stop around them.
"Okay~!" Mikoto said, honestly only mildly surprised that her sisters had decided to join the fight in Russia and somehow managed to make it onto the battlefield. They were resourceful like that. "Where did you get those tanks?"
Otaku just shrugged. "Misaka and her sisters took them as prizes after taking out an independent Russian unit that we came across whilst it was trying to fire a missile carrying an nuclear warhead at the the Star of Bethlehem from a relatively short distance nearby whilst we were on the way here. Misaka informs Onee-sama proudly."
Mikoto just nodded. And as she did, the tanks her sisters had commandeered fired their guns. Guns that they used their Electromastery to amplify and turn into railguns. Shots that, as Mikoto glanced skyward, she was pleased to see had proceeded to effectively cut off Gabriel's escape and left it to the mercies of a white hot firestorm that Naru and Ruiko had collaborated to unleash upon it. Flames that burned off the Archangel's armored skin and left it vulnerable to the pitch black and gold energy beams that Accelerator and Kazakiri-san respectively shot at it.
The devastating attack left Gabriel's body in ruins, with all but its head and the very topmost portion of its body having been disintegrated. But if that pained the Archangel, it did not show it. The only response it had was to turn its head towards the West and towards the wreck of a car that had smashed into a tree some distance away.
What's so special about that car? Mikoto couldn't help but think.
"Accel! Please tell me you didn't bring those parchments with you and left them in the car!?" Ruiko shouted in dismay as she tried to charge after the wounded Gabriel only to be forced back, as was everyone else, by the Archangel conjuring a large amount of black ice shards that it fired at them.
Said shards would have torn Mikoto and her sisters to pieces but Naru had evaded by teleporting in front of them and using her geokinesis had pulled out a thick earthen wall from the ground that shielded them. "Mikoto-senpai, everyone, you guys okay?"
"Yeah, I'm good. Otaku, what about you guys?"
Her military obsessed sister quickly consulted with a radio she had strapped onto the webbing of the winter combat uniform that she was wearing and upon receiving a reply, gave Mikoto a nod. A response that pulled a sigh of relief from Mikoto.
"Onee-sama, Namikaze-sama, I think we should be more worried about whatever the enemy Angel is doing by conjuring that pillar of energy. Misaka points out worriedly." Neko-chan said, causing Mikoto to turn towards where she had last seen Gabriel and sure enough found that it was surrounded in a pillar of blue energy.
A pillar that after a moment faded to reveal that Gabriel had somehow undergone some kind of massive transformation. A transformation that had changed it into a creature that was almost entirely made out of its wings, with its body being nothing more than a round white orb with golden lines adorning its surface but was nigh indiscernible due to the intensity of the bright blue, almost white, light that made up its wings. An orb that was protected with a layer of black ice and cradled between a pair of its smaller wings.
"Okay… That can't be good." Mikoto noted with a nervous gulp.
"You don't say." Naru said sarcastically as the Archangel conjured a series of red magic circles around itself, in front of which a number of flaming lances began to form. "Shit! It's regained the ability to cast God's Purge!? Didn't Acqua of the Back draining its Telesma mean it can't use it anymore!?"
"God's what?" Mikoto asked her friend in alarm. She wasn't familiar with whatever attack of the Archangel's that got the Number 2 so worried but just by her reaction to the spell and its name, Mikoto was feeling just as worried.
"No! Just a scaled down version! Leave them to me!" Ruiko replied as she fired down beams of rainbow lasers that intercepted the flaming lances just as Gabriel launched them.
At the same time, Accelerator and Hyouka began showering the Archangel in vacuum blades and gold colored energy arrows. Attacks that Gabriel proceeded to shield its core against by moving some of its wings in the way. It even retaliated by shooting beams with the appearance of auroras that were made out of the strange energy that seemed to permeate the air around the floating fortress.
Speaking of that strange energy, it had spiked just as Gabriel had completed its transformation and as it did, the sky had turned golden. A change that had cast the world in an unnatural gold light and gave the whole battlefield a truly otherworldly feel. A change that Mikoto simply could not ignore.
"What's happening? Is this another of the Angel's spells or whatever?" Mikoto asked, wary of the possibility of what the enemy Angel had up its metaphorical sleeves.
"No, Misaka corrects. This is not Gabriel's doing." Neko-chan said as the Sisters' tanks fired a volley of their tanks' guns, once more enhanced into railguns at the Archangel, only for it to shield itself against it with its wings. Though, it did serve to distract it enough to allow Hyouka's energy arrows, Ruiko's rainbow lasers, and Accelerator's beams of darkness to get through the first set of wings. Sadly, they were blocked by the second and third set of wings. Though, these attacks did manage to leave the Archangel open to the entropic wave that Naru sent at its core as she charged in its direction, only for Gabriel to shield itself with a cocoon of ice that it conjured with a flash of light. "Fiamma of the Right is responsible for this. Misaka elaborates. It is part of his plan to dye the word in the golden light of Heaven and fill it with a massive amount of Telesma. He aims to 'purify', or more accurately destroy, the world so as to remake it in his chosen image, that of Catholicism, by reordering the Phases whilst using his fortress as a temple and drawing out the power of his Holy Right arm whilst within that temple. Misaka finishes explaining."
In response to Neko-chan's lengthy explanation, Mikoto could just blink in confusion. One that was not even shaken even as her sisters' tanks fired off yet another salvo of their enhanced cannons.
"Misaka has been designated to be the Network's expert on magic since Misaka is friends with Index, a famous magical expert. Misaka explains with an embarrassed blush."
"Okay. I guess that makes sense." Mikoto said with a nod to hide her incomprehension of her sister's explanation of what their enemy was up to. "So, in summary, Fiamma of the Right just got more powerful like his Angel and this fight just got even harder, right?"
"That is a good summation of things. Misaka agrees." Otaku agreed with a nod as the tanks' guns roared again behind them.
Mikoto nodded back before taking a steadying breath. "Alright! That doesn't matter! I don't care how strong they are! We'll win this no matter what!"
Argh! Accel did leave the parchment in the car! Ruiko thought with an angry realization. Anger at her boyfriend's foolishness and her own forgetfulness for not reminding him to avoid making such an asinine mistake.
She knew that Fiamma wanted the parchments for some reason but she hadn't expected it would lead to allowing Gabriel to achieve some kind of more powerful form. How in the world did that crazy Angel somehow decipher them from such a long distance anyway!? And unlike mere mortals like Accel and I, aren't Christian Angels supposed to be perfect beings!? How is it that it can evolve!?
"Ruiko, any ideas on how to handle this!? 'Cos what we've been doing isn't working." Accel asked as they both evaded a barrage of beams of raw Telesma with the appearance of auroras that Gabriel shot their way. In the meantime, Hyouka had conjured a shield in front of herself and was charging through the barrage whilst holding a energy lance in her free hand, preparing to impale the Archangel should she manage to get close. At the same time, Mikoto-senpai and her sisters were bombarding the so-called Governor of the Blue with railgun shots in a futile bid to distract it.
"Yeah, Rui-chan. We need a new plan." Naru-chan said as she floated up to join her and Accel.
For a moment, Ruiko felt a surge of irritation at being forced to come up with their battleplan when everyone else on their side, besides arguably Hyouka, was a genius in their own right. But she swiftly swept that irritation aside to do what needed to be done. After all, as it so happened, she did have a new plan in mind.
"Accel, did you finish deciphering the fundamentals of magic from analyzing the math of the parchments?" Ruiko asked as she decided to fight fire with fire.
Her boyfriend grunted in acknowledgement.
"Then try drawing in the Telesma from the air and infuse it into your wings." Ruiko suggested. "It should give you a nice little boost that if we're lucky will help us turn the tides."
"Right. I'll give it a go." Accel said as he obediently did as he was told and golden particles began flowing in from the air around and into his wings.
"Naru-chan, help me defend Accel." Ruiko said as she conjured a multilayered barrier just in time to block an aurora beam that Gabriel shot at her boyfriend.
"Got it!" Naru-chan replied as she sent an entropic wave at the aurora beam that had been trying to drill its way through Ruiko's barrier, draining much of its strength and forcing it to peter out. At the same time, Hyouka, Mikoto-senpai and the Sisters amped up their attacks, trying to distract Gabriel away from Accel.
It was a futile gesture though as Gabriel seemed quite capable of ignoring their efforts even as concentrated fire from Senpai and her sisters successfully blasted one of its wings off and Hyouka managed to cut off two more with her lance. Fortunately however Accel worked quickly and he had barely started when he was already done.
In a burst of golden light that prompted Ruiko to turn around, she was greeted with the sight of Accel somehow having managed to transform into an even higher level of Angel. He had lost his tornado wings but his feathered wings had become a pair of classical feathered angel wings, with a golden halo over his head and his whole body was surrounded by a golden light.
"It's time to kick your ass, Gabriel!" Accel, now sporting his newly upgraded Angel Mode, shouted as he proceeded to charge the Archangel.
A sight that had Ruiko sighing in frustration as she fired off rainbow beams of AIM to join the beams of golden Telesma that Accel was adding to the continued fire from Mikoto-senpai and the Sisters that were suppressing Gabriel and trying to cover his attempt to close with it. "I really wish AIM beings like me could just absorb energy and upgrade my form."
"It's not too bad." Hyouka said as she floated over to join Ruiko and Naru-chan. She was panting slightly and clearly needed a breather. "We have our own advantages, like not being torn apart by the clashing powers of AIM and Telesma which Accelerator-sama has to withstand to maintain that newly enhanced Angel Mode of his."
"Wait! He needs to deal with that to use that powered up Angel Mode?" Naru-chan asked with a gasp as she added entropic waves and fireballs to the suppressive fire being shot at Gabriel. "Is that really a good idea?"
Ruiko shrugged. "It's fine. He's strong enough to handle it."
"Oh! It's going for a flash freeze again. It must be really scared of an amped up Accelerator." Naru-chan commented with an amused smirk as the Archangel unleashed a flash of light from its core, and as it did in the previous occasion that it had used this technique, the unnatural light proceeded to reduce the temperature of its immediate vicinity to absolute zero.
As a result, Gabriel was surrounded by a large solid chunk of black ice, a veritable glacier floating in the sky, which it used as a combination of a defensive shell and resources from which it proceeded to forge various projectiles and other weapons that it hurled at them. Thankfully, considering that the Archangel had used this tactic, or something similar, multiple times already in this fight so far, they all easily evaded the counterattack.
Well most of them, as unlike the rest of them, Mikoto-senpai, the Sisters and Accelerator did not. The former two instead choosing to instead shield themselves via calling down bolts of lightning from the sky that intercepted anything that was headed their way. For his part, Accelerator just conjured a shell of Telesma around himself that disintegrated everything launched his way and continued with his charge, completing it.
"Your boyfriend is a rabid dog sometimes, you know that, Rui-chan?" Naru-chan asked rhetorically as they all watched Accelerator grab hold of one of Gabriel's wings and proceed to literally rip it free. A brutality that he continued to exercise as he used his bare hands to tear the Archangel apart, using a shell of Telesma and his Redirection to protect himself from any attacks that Gabriel sent his way.
"Yes, he can be. Doesn't it make him dashing?"
Naru-chan gagged at Ruiko's honesty and even Hyouka shot her a disbelieving look. She would've been offended but she had long since made her peace with no one understanding why she found her boyfriend's more murderous tendencies charming. As such, she instead turned her attention to carrying out the next phase of her plan.
"Hyouka, stay here and back Accel up if he needs it, 'kay?"
"Sure, Onee-sama. But why?"
Ruiko just smirked. "You'll see. Naru-chan, follow me. I need Mikoto-senpai's help to make my plan work."
Knowing her friend would follow, Ruiko did not waste time waiting for a response before teleporting to Mikoto-senpai's side.
"Senpai, could you pool your power with your sisters to fire this with the most powerful railgun all of you can manage?" Ruiko asked as soon as she rematerialized and gestured to a superdense, perfectly aerodynamic projectile that she conjured with her emulated Dark Matter and kept floating in the air above their formation of tanks with some telekinesis.
"Right!" Mikoto-senpai said with a nod, trusting her so much that she did not even bother to question what Ruiko had in mind. "Otaku! Neko-chan! Everyone! You heard what Ruiko said! Let's build the most powerful railgun we can manage!"
Even as Mikoto-senpai and her sisters began using their Electromastery to form the electromagnetic rails that would launch the projectile that Ruiko had conjured for them, enough so to keep it floating in the air without her help, she released her telekinetic hold on it and turned to Naru-chan.
"What do you want me to do, Rui-chan?" Naru-chan asked as she looked away from Accel continuing to rip more of Gabriel's wings from its body and Hyouka supporting him with AIM energy arrows to turn to her expectantly.
"According to what the latest update to your Bank entry said, you have unlocked a new Micro Phase, have you not? Could you use it on Gabriel?"
"You accessed the Bank remotely while we were fighting Gabriel!?"
Ruiko just shrugged. She needed to know what new capabilities, if any, her allies had. It was just the thing to do. So what if she used one of her multiple thought processes to hack into an orbiting communications satellite to remotely access the Bank back in the City to get that update she needed.
"So can you do it or not?"
Naru-chan shot her an incredulous look for a moment before just sighing in exasperation. "Sure. Tell me when."
Ruiko nodded and turned to Mikoto-senpai, who nodded back. Satisfied, Ruiko prepared to put the finishing touch on things.
"Mikoto-senpai, Naru-chan, on my mark. Three."
In response, the electromagnetic rails created to shoot the Dark Matter projectile began to build in intensity as the [Railgun] and her sisters poured even more power into them in their own final touch.
"Two." Ruiko said as she saw Naru-chan narrow her eyes in concentration.
"One! Hit that Angel!"
At the completion of her countdown, the Number 5 and her sisters fired their railgun and launched the Dark Matter shell that Ruiko had conjured flying with a sonic boom and as it streaked across the sky, left a fiery trail of plasma in its wake. Simultaneously, Naru-chan unleashed her new Micro Phase on Gabriel, transmuting the ice it had surrounded its core and said core's outermost layer, that is to say its armor, into plasma and thus greatly reducing its defense. Thus as the supercharged railgun smashed into it, it shattered like glass. As it did, the Archangel released an ear splitting screech of pain and the rest of its body fell apart into golden particles of Telesma as it was dispelled from the physical Phase.
They had at long last defeated the Archangel Gabriel, the Power of God.
It was over! That damned Angel had finally been defeated! Despite seeing it with her own eyes, Mikoto couldn't help but be amazed at what they had just accomplished. Angels, straight out of the Christian Bible no less, were real and dang did that make her feel smaller than she thought she was. At the same time, she wanted to cheer. It was a massive victory after all.
And, of course, it was whilst she was still busy trying to choose how she should feel when things went straight to hell when the Star of Bethlehem, as Fiamma's floating fortress was called in the intel Kazari had dug up on the way over from the City, started to groan and shake and pieces of it began coming off. In small chunks at first until a few moments later, a significant chuck broke off and started its descent to earth.
Seeing that, the [Railgun]'s heart leapt to her throat.
"Excuse me, excuse me everyone!" Mikoto winced a little as Ruiko's voice wormed into her ear. Probably thanks to some audiokinesis? Probably. "All forces in the area, it seems that the Anglican, Catholic and Russian Orthodox Churcheshave revoked the spells that Fiamma of the Right has been using to maintain his fortress, the Star of Bethlehem, and as a result it is about to come crashing down to earth. We need to destroy the Star before it does. If we don't and it comes down intact, it will do so with the strength of a major meteor impact and with it supercharged with Telesma as it is, that would lead to vast amounts of devastation."
"Ruiko, what do we need to do? It won't be enough if we just go blasting it, right? You're coordinating things, right?" Mikoto asked as she looked to the Number 2 expectantly.
The voice of her kohai was silent and she could hear the hesitation in her voice as she spoke directly to her. "Senpai, I'm in no position to order around the combined forces we have gathered here."
"YEAH BUT DOES ANYONE ELSE KNOW WHAT IS TRULY AT STAKE AND CAN DO THE JOB?!" The sound of Naru, the stupid little Usagi, screamed at the top of her lungs to be heard by everyone in the damn area. Yep, that proved Ruiko was definitely using audiokinesis.
An audible sigh was heard over the wind and Ruiko spoke up once more. "Okay, I need all forces to…"
As Ruiko began issuing orders to the gathered forces and they leapt to obey her commands, Mikoto couldn't help but smile. Now that was more like it! Seriously, the [AIM Sovereign] was truly the best at multitasking and coordinating.
Speaking of obeying Ruiko's commands, Accelerator was one of the most eager to step up to the plate in that regard. With an enthusiastic roar, he flared his wings and raised one of his palms skyward. In response, the strange energy that still permeated the air began to manifest in golden particles that coiled around his hand before gathering above his open palm in a churning, ever growing orb.
As he prepared what must be a powerful attack, Ruiko and Kazakiri-san flew to below the Star of Bethlehem and grasped the bottom of the crashing, crumbling fortress. The moment they had a firm grip, the two AIM Angels spread their wings to what appeared to be their maximum extent and with twin, synced cries of defiance, they began pushing the Star upwards with all their might, slowing its descent and giving everyone else more time to get their act together.
This was however not without consequence. The force that Ruiko and her sister could apply to the Star was uneven at best and thus whilst they managed to slow the fall of its main body, the extremities did not enjoy the benefit of the additional lift they provided. Said extremities thus began to break off and crash to earth at high speed. It was in response to this that Naru stepped in and using the power of her Hexe Frame, deployed her Micro Phases to their fullest. Using her Hyper Accelerated Entropy, she disintegrated chunk after chunk whilst she simultaneously used her Recursive Temporal State to trap those she failed to destroy with her entropic powers in time stops. In this way, she dealt with all but the biggest chunks.
Those? Those were, as per Ruiko's instructions, Mikoto's to deal with.
Even as she once more synced up her electromagnetic field with her sisters, Mikoto simultaneously used her Electromastery to transmit a radio message on a broad spectrum wide area call. "To all forces with anti-air capability, just like Ruiko said… Shoot those damn pieces out of the sky!"
At her command, bombardment spells and all manner of weapons shot up from the earth in a frankly awe inspiring display of firepower and proceeded to slam into the falling chunks with a fury. Spells wreaked all manner of damage upon them that ranged from mundane explosions to exotic phenomena that Mikoto could not properly describe. Mundane missiles exploded in a cacophony of explosions. Anti-aircraft rounds slammed into their targets and through sheer kinetic force ground them down. Through a combination of all these efforts, all but the largest of the falling chunks were turned to relatively harmless dust and even the biggest debris were whittled down such that their landings were mostly safe.
But that still left the main body of the Star to contend with and as valiant as Ruiko and Hyouka's efforts were, they could not keep it airborne forever. Thankfully, they didn't need to.
Just as Mikoto was starting to worry, Accelerator finally finished gathering the energy he needed for his attack. An attack that he shot at the Star in the form of a beam of golden light that pierced through the impressive mass of the flying fortress, disintegrating the vast majority of it before shooting off past the limits of Earth's atmosphere and into vast blackness of space before finally petering out.
This was met with an earth shaking cheer from the allied forces, but even in their celebration, Mikoto was pleased to see that no one slacked off in doing what needed to be done. For though Accelerator had dealt with the main mass of the Star, there were still plenty of fragments that they had to deal with. Debris that continued to fall to earth and through Naru's Micro Phases and had to be destroyed by the combined forces.
Even as they did so, Accelerator's cackling echoed throughout the area as he flew past the falling wreckage of the Star and delivered it a coup de grâce. Said deathblow took the form of the One Way Road flying down and through the remnants of the once mighty fortress like the fist of god, shattering them into ever smaller, more manageable pieces.
His rather violent finishing stroke caused Ruiko and Kazakiri to fall back a bit to avoid friendly fire but that did not mean they became idle. Even though they both looked visibly exhausted by their efforts so far, they both proceeded to add their own efforts to the bombardment whittling down the larger chunks of debris that got past Naru.
All in all, after an intense few minutes of frantic action, the remains of the Star of Bethlehem crashed into the ground with the fury equivalent to a particularly nasty hailstorm, sending snow and earth flying. One that undoubtedly cost many men who had been unfortunate enough to be hit by the debris their lives. However, that was still far better than the magical nuke it could have been.
"Okay, who's done? Because I am exhausted." Naru groaned as the winds gently caressed her as she floated down to earth alongside Rui-chan, Accelerator and Hyouka-san.
"Same." Rui-chan muttered as she leaned against her boyfriend. Somehow their wings weren't getting tangled up even as they held each tight whilst they all floated down from the sky after the conclusion of their titanic battle against the materialized Christian Archangel Gabriel and helping to prevent the crash of the Star of Bethlehem.
"I could go for a nap." Hyouka-san agreed with a giggle whilst the Number 1 Esper, apparently feeling taciturn, grunted in agreement. Or maybe, in a rare moment of self-awareness, he was feeling embarrassed by the public display of affection he was engaging in with his shameless girlfriend.
Speaking of my bestie and her shamelessness…
"Rui-chan, just asking but I don't have to worry about figuring out a way to help you force Accelerator here into a shotgun wedding, do I?"
Hyouka-san blushed crimson at the idea of her sister needing something like that and sputtered nonsense, which just went to show just how thick the rose-tinted glasses the AIM Angel wore when it came to her beloved Onee-sama. In contrast, the couple in question just shot Naru blank looks.
"Honestly, Naru. I was a statue half the time, did you think we found the time to get up to any hanky panky?" Rui-chan said, sounding mostly unimpressed, though there was a well hidden hint of amusement in her tone.
"Yeah, you horny bunny, I'm no agalmatophiliac." Accel spat.
Naru just shrugged unrepentantly. "Yeah, well, I didn't think I'd need to worry but as your bestie I still needed to ask, ya know? You and your boyfriend were off alone, without any supervision, for days. Who knew what you got up to during that time?"
"Yeah, I'm with Naru. It had to be asked." Mikoto-senpai said with a nod as their descent got within hearing range of her and the Council of Misakas' battalion of purloined tanks that they had been aiming for the whole time. "You know Kiyama-sensei will ask the same question too once things calm down."
"I know." Rui-chan said with a tired sigh. "Why can't everyone have more trust in Accel and I?"
"I trust you, Onee-sama." Hyouka-san said loyally, earning her a grateful smile from her sister.
Everyone else though, including Accel, the Council of Misakas and the other Sisters that accompanied them, all snorted or made some other sign of disbelief at the notion that Rui-chan could be trusted to not push the sexual side of her relationship with her boyfriend. As it was, Naru was willing to bet all the money in her bank accounts that the only reason that her bestie hadn't taken the opportunity of their Russian trip to do so was her being distracted by other matters. If not, she was 100% sure she'd be throwing her classmate a baby shower soon.
"I'm not that bad!" Rui-chan said with a pout as they all landed and she pulled away from Accelerator to cross her arms over her bust and glare at everyone but her sister.
I honestly can't tell if she's seriously upset or if she's just joking around. Kurama commented as he did Naru a solid and helped her dismiss her Demon Frame and reabsorb the chakra that had made it back into her body.
Thanks, Partner. And honestly? I don't know either. It's always a little hard to tell with Rui-chan.
"Says the girl who we had to regularly remind to not cross the line just a few weeks ago." Mikoto-senpai said with a shake of her head.
"She's got you there, Ruiko." Accelerator added as he dismissed his Angel Mode. "You were practically a nymphomaniac just a short while ago before you suddenly went all ojou-sama. If I was in their shoes, I'd worry too."
"Onee-sama hasn't been like that in weeks!" Hyouka-san said as dismissed her own Angel Mode and moved to stand next to her sister, with her arms crossed and glaring at everyone else just like her sibling.
"A few weeks honestly isn't that long ago, Rui-chan." Naru pointed out as she accepted a canteen that was handed to her by an unfamiliar Sister, who likely lived outside the City. "So like Accel said, it's normal for us to worry."
Rui-chan, who was still in her Angel Mode, shot her boyfriend an annoyed look at him siding against her but he just shrugged. This seemed to annoy her though and she reached out and smacked the top of his head with one of her wings.
"You do realize if we did get up to something you'd be just as much to blame, right, Accel? It takes two to make the beast with two backs."
First, 'hanky panky' and now 'the beast with two backs'? Damn… Rui-chan has really become an ojou-sama, huh?
Look like. Kurama replied with an agreeing hum.
"Yeah," Accelerator said, rubbing the back of his head gingerly. "But we'd all know who started it if we did end up doing anything."
This was met with a chorus of agreement from those gathered.
"I hate you all." She said in an angry, defeated huff as she finally dismissed her Angel Mode.
"No, you don't." Senpai said with a chuckle. "But seriously, how are you, Ruiko? You too, Naru? You guys, alright?"
"I'm fine, Mikoto-senpai." Rui-chan assured the Number 5 as she pulled her phone out of her skirt pocket and waved away the canteen one of the Sisters offered her. "I'll tell you everything that happened to me later. In the meantime, Accel, come here! We need to call Kaa-san and check in on her and the girls."
"Right." Her boyfriend said as he hurried over, returning the canteen he had just taken a gulp from to the Sister who had just passed it to him.
Watching as the couple huddled around Rui-chan's phone as her bestie used it to contact her family, Naru turned to an annoyed looking [Railgun].
"Be patient, Senpai." Naru scolded the Electromaster. "Rui-chan promised she'd tell you everything later. Just give her time to check base with her kids first. You know how it is, family comes first."
"Yes, it does." Hyouka-san agreed as she walked over, giving the couple some privacy. "Onee-sama is really worried about her mother and daughters. Last she knew, the base they were in was under attack by the City."
That brought both Naru and Mikoto-senpai up short and they turned to the AIM being in alarm.
"Why would the City be attacking them!?" Senpai growled out, electricity sparking off her body in a sign of her agitation.
Hyouka-san shrugged. "I have no idea."
"I might." Naru said as she thought over the matter. "Have an idea, I mean."
"What is it?" Senpai demanded.
She sure is impatient today, huh?
Well, she has probably been worrying about you and Saten since you both disappeared off to Russia. All that concern has probably left her pretty wound up.
Probably. Naru agreed. Better not tell her Kamijou was probably on that flying fortress fighting Fiamma then or she'll really freak out.
Last she'd had the chance to check, intel had it that Kamijou was off to confront Fiamma and based on everything Naru knew of the [Imagine Breaker], she was sure he'd managed to reach him. Heck, she would bet good money that Kamijou had been the one to take that Catholic fop down.
Yeah. Let's save the revelation that her crush was almost certainly in the floating fortress she just helped blow up for after whoever your boss sends to pick him up confirms he's safely on his way back to the City first. We'd save your senpai a heart attack that way.
Agreed. Naru replied with amusement at Kurama's exaggerated but likely largely accurate prediction of how Mikoto-senpai would react to news about her crush having been on Fiamma's flying fortress. Though, I'm surprised you're so confident Kamijou survived that thing's collapse. Even for him, managing something like that would be quite an achievement.
He's a Hero. He'll manage. They always do.
I don't disagree but why do you have such a high opinion of Heroes?
'Cos my father was one. Kurama replied with a mental shrug.
Your dad, huh? You've never talked to me about him before. Or much of your past come to think of it. I barely know the basics.
That's my fault. We weren't exactly partners until recently and, well, after we did become equals it kinda slipped my mind. I'll tell you more about him and my siblings when we get back home and can relax, alright? Kurama promised apologetically before continuing. In the meantime, I think you might want to answer your senpai's question before she blows a fuse.
I'll hold you to that promise. Naru replied. But yeah, we'll talk later.
"Well, Rui-chan and Accelerator are considered fugitives by the City so-"
"That's not the case anymore, Namikaze-sama. Misaka cuts in." Military Otaku-chan said as she seemingly finished giving her sisters their orders on how to handle things now that the fight was over and finally got around to talking to them. "About the same time that the fight with Fiamma's Angel started, their fugitive status was lifted and their standing in the City was fully restored. Misaka explains. So the attack was called off accordingly. Misaka adds."
The news had Naru, Mikoto-senpai and Hyouka-san all breathing a sigh of relief.
If Rui-chan and Accelerator were still fugitives in the eyes of the City, getting that status revoked would likely be troublesome in the extreme.
I can just imagine the favors that your boss would demand of us.
Yeah. Naru agreed wholeheartedly. The City's General Superintendent was an asshole. Whatever it was, it would've been an absolute pain.
"No need to worry, everyone." Rui-chan reassured them as having finished her call, she rejoined the conversation. "Everything is good between the City and Accel and I."
"That's good, Onee-sama." Hyouka-san said, offering her sister a relieved smile. "I don't have to worry about you getting in trouble with the City for the whole time until I see you again."
Rui-chan offered her sister a smile in further reassurance as if understanding what Hyouka-san meant. Everyone else though just shot her confused or questioning looks.
"I can feel my connection to the physical Phase starting to fray." The AIM Angel explained to them before turning her attention back to her sister. "Have a good rest and I'll catch up with you and everyone back in the City, Onee-sama."
"You should rest well too, Hyouka." Rui-chan said, offering her sister a wave. "I'll see you soon."
"Yeah, we'll catch up with you another time, Kazakiri-san." Senpai said, offering the AIM Angel her own wave.
Everyone else just made do with some tired sound of acknowledgement or other. Not that Hyouka-san seemed to mind as she continued exchanging waves of farewells with Rui-chan even as she began to fade out of the physical Phase and presumably back to the Imaginary Number District that was supposedly her home.
She had just finished disappearing when there was a sound of a roaring jet engine overhead and everyone looked up to see a plane begin to circle their position, clearly looking for a place to land. Senpai started at the sight of the plane and immediately turned to Rui-chan.
"Um, Ruiko, you wouldn't happen to know if there's any nearby airfields where Kazari-san and Kuroko can land, would you?"
"Senpai! You forgot about Kazari-chan and Kuroko-chan? Shame!" Naru teased, causing their forgetful senpai to blush crimson.
The [Railgun] seemed ready to sputter out a denial or some other weak defense of her lapse but Rui-chan, the nice guy that she was, cut her off and saved her the trouble.
"I've already forwarded directions to the plane for a place where they can land."
Naru couldn't help it. She chuckled.
"Rui-chan, you're always so damned efficient."
Rui-chan just shrugged.
"Looks like our ride is here." Accel said suddenly as he looked off in the distance.
Turning towards where he was looking, Naru saw a small army worth of military vehicles that ranged from trucks to APCs (armored personnel carriers) to tanks heading towards them. All whilst a trio of Maniple's Rifleman Mobile Weapons strode alongside them providing a rather intimidating overwatch. And standing in the lead jeep and holding a megaphone was none other than Kurozuma-san.
"Hey! Ojou-samas, ready to go home!?"
His question was met with enthusiastic agreement from every member of the Trinity.
It was long past time for them to head back to Academy City. To head home.
Within the depths of the great void of the Phase which she had taken for her current abode, Babalon's wicked smile grew wider as she peeked into the near future to glimpse what recent events surrounding the battle against Fiamma of the Right would have for the world she had found herself so invested in recently. After all, she was ever so eager to see how the negotiations would go once World War 3 formally concluded. It was sure to be entertaining! Especially with the progress she had achieved in her project with the Trinity.
"Hm, hm, Fiamma graciously accepting his defeat? Mildly surprising, but expected. [Imagine Breaker] seems to have that kind of effect on his opponents. And a cessation of hostilities between the various belligerents of World War 3? A little boring." She confessed as if she were just reading the newspaper and as she flipped the metaphorical page, a small cackle escaped her at what she saw. "Oh, Academy City being forced to accept oversight from the world powers and Magic Side of all of its activities? Either that or face an all out invasion from said coalition? Aleister must be pouting at this!"
Her humor was sadly short-lived however and with a sigh, a frown crossed her face. "Phooey. That same oversight means that furthering a good number of my plans for little Accelerator and the Trinity are now off the table. At least my more 'morally' questionable ones. Implementing them whilst the world has an eye on the City will invite attention and interference that I'd rather avoid."
Although, maybe that was a blessing in disguise. Her little proteges would be less likely to get upset with her actions if the Incidents she manipulated to come to pass were less immoral. They were becoming admirably, if somewhat irritatingly, morally upright people as of late. They had the influence of Misaka Mikoto's upstanding character for that.
Though whether that is a good or bad thing overall remains to be seen. Babylon mused. It makes them more balanced and stable individuals which is a good thing. It wouldn't do to reach the heights I wish to elevate them to whilst being unstable and then lashing out with the powers they would gain in unproductive ways. Yet, their growing morality and my need to work around it is slowing their rate of growth, which is decidedly undesirable. Delays that are particularly concerning considering the Sword of Damocles that is the threat posed by the Demon of Dispersion.
Her contemplation was interrupted when she felt a shift in the space of her Phase and turning towards it, she was greeted by the sight of her 'brother'. "Aiwass, how nice of you to visit."
"I am merely here to confirm that the plan is still in progress?"
"Oh without question. The Age of Horus' Angel of Tears and Taxiarch are well on their way to ascension." Babalon informed him, smiling in glee as she recalled the stellar progress little Ruiko and Accelerator had made over their jaunt across Russia.
"Indeed, your Samael is also on track, but your Ramiel seems to be lagging behind the rest."
"Aiwass, rest assured, everything is proceeding smoothly. They'll be ready by the time it makes its move."
Everything hurts. That was the first thing that entered Touma's mind as he regained consciousness after the fall of Fiamma's Star of Bethlehem. I was really born under an unlucky star, huh?
It was with his mind filled with such depressing thoughts that the [Imagine Breaker] grit his teeth and grunted in effort to push a rock off him enough that could use his blooded fingers to drag himself out from under it. His legs felt like limp noodles but he nevertheless pushed himself to his feet and began staggering, occasionally having to climb over some obstacle or another, through the piece of the Star that had miraculously survived the crash upon the earth intact and which he found himself in.
"Seriously, I need a vacation after this." He lamented tiredly as he grunted in pain. His trek through the wreckage was not doing anything good for his injuries from his fight with Fiamma and the crash of the Star that followed shortly afterwards.
But as he finally reached the opening in the ruins that was letting in sunlight and had been his goal up till now and saw the snowy Russian landscape beyond, he couldn't help a faint smile of relief.
Almost there. He told himself as he began to carefully climb down from the opening, which unfortunately had been perched a good twenty odd feet off the ground. He was lucky enough to have survived.
Of course, being the most unfortunate person alive, this was exactly when his luck turned and his foot got caught.
"Fukou da!" He cried out in equal parts frustration and dismay as his careful descent transformed into a mad tumble down the side of the pile of wreckage that he'd been trapped in.
Thankfully, his luck, such as it was, had not fully abandoned him, and using experience and tricks he had learned from being in far too many similar situations for his liking, he quickly managed to control his fall with a few rolls so that he landed on his feet near the bottom. It wasn't a particularly pleasant landing however and it left him wobbling where he stood but…
At least I didn't faceplant. Again.
He sadly did that often enough as is. So that he had avoided that fate this time was honestly quite a relief.
With that somewhat positive thought in mind, Touma pushed past the pain that had been threatening to engulf his being this entire time, mustered up his determination and took a step forward.
Sadly, sheer determination could only take one so far and the [Imagine Breaker] barely made it a few feet before his body gave out on him. His knees buckled first and he began to fall forward. He immediately tried to shoot his arms forward to catch his fall, but his exhausted arms refused to listen and stubbornly refused to move as he commanded. Thus much to his chagrin, he collapsed face first into the snow.
So much for not face planting. Touma thought with resignation as his vision began to darken and the unpleasantly familiar feeling of unconsciousness began to creep up on him. I guess I can take comfort in the fact that the snow is nice and cold.
It was a far cry from some of the more uncomfortable surfaces that he'd passed out on in the past.
With this sad thought in mind, Kamijou Touma, [Imagine Breaker] and Hero of World War 3, finally passed out.
Done and done! Thanks to Nameless as always!
I will not lie, this exploded on us. Not in a bad way, but in the way as it went from bullet point detail to all of THIS. Yikes, we are too good at our non-profit job! Who-boy, alright so I hope you all enjoyed the end of the WW3 Arc. It took a bit, but we got here people, cheers!
Nameless: So, remember how we were worried about this chapter being too short for the standards of this arc? Well, I think we can put those worries to rest. It didn't turn out to be the longest chapter of the arc, but it definitely turned out to have a respectable length. We hope that it also contained enough engaging content to accompany that length.
Speaking of said content, I hope you guys liked a few callbacks we made to certain things from previous arcs throughout this one. Some are the results of deliberate foreshadowing (the Demon Tamers; Ruiko being able to use a gun and her special bullets, particularly her Electroshock bullets; reusing previously introduced Dark Siders) that we had planned in advance whilst others are things we added as we wrote (the micro sun that Naru and Ruiko created as a combo; Ruiko and Hyouka creating a black hole with Kimi Shundan's ability). However, regardless of their origin, I personally think this was pretty well done in this arc. Do let us know if you agree.
E4E: So many callbacks happened in this arc with past characters, original plot points and even more. It was a treat to write and one I won't be forgetting. It took us some time, but it was well worth it as you can all see from the content size! Be sure to tell us what you enjoyed most in the entire arc!
Nameless: One last thing before I leave it to E4E to sign off… I just wanted to head off any criticism we might get for not spelling out the finer details of Ruiko's orders to the gathered forces when she coordinated everyone's efforts to blast apart the remains of the Star of Bethlehem. We did that because we are nowhere close to being sufficiently well versed in military commands to pull that off, so we just skipped over it. Hope you don't mind.
E4E: You know what to do! Smash that review button and tell us what you love! No flames and peace off my peeps!