Turned out that activating a simple spell broke something more than just blood vessels. Some form of internal bleeding had occurred around his abdomen. Thankfully, his quick arrival at the emergency room alleviated some of the worse injuries.
So, I'm back in the hospital once more.
"In conclusion, Ureapaddy Exica gave up on her goal?" Haru asked.
Kamijou Touma was sitting next to him, near the hospital bed. It was morning again, and the sun was high up in the sky.
"Seems so. Sorry for putting you in a wild goose chase."
"No need. I do this sort of thing on a daily basis. I've found nothing regarding Ureapaddy Exica during my search, but you took care of that problem, so that does not matter."
"Thanks. Say, Haru, you sound... a bit different." Touma took a note of his expression. "Did something happen? Receive some kind of news?"
Even when he was disguising his emotions it wasn't enough, it appeared. How this guy had the ability to see his true feelings through his facade was beyond him. Was it another power of Imagine Breaker?
"Oh, nothing much. Perhaps my mood is being affected by my injury."
Nothing much indeed. He had personally buried a dead body many hours before; of course something was deeply wrong. But there was no point in telling anyone about that event. He had dealt with death before, and it was nothing special. Sure, it put a gigantic damper on your mood for a while, but you got over it, eventually.
… But, the shock never really got any better no matter how much he experienced it.
In order to prevent trauma from occurring, he had to focus on detachment and lack of concern over the incident. Distancing himself from the victim, viewing himself as blame-free.
And he hated himself for doing that.
Many hours before...
A dead man, who had his eyes wide open, was lying on the ground. Multiple bullet holes covered the body. The blood itself did not cease to flow.
Did he feel any sort of righteous fury? To tell the truth, his mind was blank. A naive person would consider him to be in some sort of shock, but this was nothing but a deployment of self-defense mechanism, naturally executed in order to shield his mind through pseudo-detachment.
He needed to get up. He needed to clear the body. As he did not see the corpse and the blood when he first entered the scrapyard approximately seven hours after (he had transmigrated eight hours back into the past to fight this battle), he needed to clear all signs of this particular struggle before his past-self entered in here.
But he felt no strength; there was a strong lack of willingness to move at the present time.
Slowly reaching into the man's robes, Haru began to search for any information regarding the ones that this person wished to protect. Inside, there was a leather wallet, filled with some number of cash, and for some reason, a driver's license.
Valin Sagar. That was the man's name.
And then, there was another picture of Valin, with a younger person within his arms, both of them smiling ear to ear.
Mercy. Did he have to break the news to this unfortunate person whom he never even met?
But it was his duty, his promise to the deceased. It had to be fulfilled. Nothing else to it.
Searching further he found a folded up piece of paper, a wine flask, and a collection of keys. After he opened up the folded letter he began to read:
To whoever it may concern,
If you are currently reading this letter, then most likely you have
witnessed my death. If you are an outsider who had not accepted
my request for protection of my loved ones, place this paper back
without reading any further and let the dead rest in peace. My
son knows of my situation, and hides himself among the masses
in India. Please, contact him through whatever means necessary
and inform him of my death. He will not believe you and think
of you as an enemy attempting to deceive him. Please, take
whatever evidence necessary in order to convince him. It is my
last and only wish. I beg you, fulfill it for this unfortunate father.
—Valin Sagar
He stared at the piece of paper for quite a long while. Finally, standing up, he took out his phone, and took detailed pictures of the corpse itself. At his present state, he couldn't think of any other way to convince his son of his father's death.
"Goodness." Haru muttered. It would be pretty bad if someone attempted to look through his phone after all this.
Using Valin's clothing he decided to drag the body toward a more deserted location. After some contemplation he came to a conclusion that it would be most respectful to bury the body. It would have to be within a common place, a public graveyard, of sorts. That brought up another question; did Academy City even have a public cemetery? Taking out his phone he began to search through the map of the area.
However, he soon realized that even if he did find a public graveyard, it would be well regulated and protected through guards and technology, and dragging a dead body toward them would only land him in a jail, facing a murder charge. It was truly a damning situation. Stumped, he stood for a while, considering his next course of action.
He would need to bury it within a location that had little to no people around. Also, there had to be no surveillance camera around whatsoever, otherwise he would be in deep trouble. Anti-Skill area pretty much fit the bill, but they were active at night, and he would not be able to evade or fight them while dragging a dead weight around.
Then, the idea of burying the body right outside the car scrapyard occurred to him. The carnage and destruction caused by others surely would serve as a distraction for the body hidden deep beneath the ground. It was a good of a plan as any, and there was no need to drag the body around anywhere.
Forming a shovel with his ability, he began to dig through the earth within a quiet and desolate part of the scrapyard. Beads of sweat ran down on his body as he let his muscles take over the digging.
… What am I even doing? Haru chuckled humorlessly as he contemplated the absurdity of the situation. Burying a dead body within a place I am attempting to hide within. This is nuts! Still, Haru thought as he began to engrave a nearby piece of steel for the headstone, I at the very least should do this.
In the end, a flat and unnoticeable grave remained right outside of the scrapyard. A small piece of metal with some words engraved upon it was buried alongside with the corpse.
Dexteritas418
With his strength he
protected his loved
ones until the end.
—On hindsight, he wasn't sure whether his spelling of Valin's magic name was correct or not.
Sunlight still shone through the windows. It had been hours since his last visitor had left. Bored through his skull, Haru aimlessly toyed around with his phone, hoping to find something to pass time with.
Who were those people that killed Valin? Various red dots appeared around the man's body and disappeared just as quickly. There was no evidence left behind of their presence. And, furthermore, there was no reason to kill the man, and even if there was, there was even less reason for them to spare himself. Granted, his subconscious emergency temporal shift would have kicked in, but even then he doubted its effectiveness against multiple snipers.
Valin was killed, and there were several possible reasons for his death. Perhaps he was killed because he had failed a mission; for example, his own assassination. Perhaps he had other enemies present within the city. Perhaps this was the way Academy City's forces dispatched their interlopers. In that case he himself should have been killed also.
Mystery abounded within his head, but he wasn't given much time to sort through them; the door to the hospital room opened once more. Frowning, Haru turned his head toward the entrance. Touma had already visited him, and other doctors and nurses had already told him everything they wanted to say, so who was it?
A girl with tea colored hair and Tokiwadai outfit entered the room.
"Zaza." Haru smiled. "Hows it going?"
"Misaka sees that you injured yourself again." The girl replied in a monotonous voice. "I have come to ask you of your health and your help."
"Well, I'll be fine—soon, anyway." Haru flipped through some magazines while speaking. "What do you need help with? I probably need to watch my injury, but I already spent over a day cooped up in here."
"The Tree Diagram Remnant was successfully recovered by the 23rd district of Academy City. Rebuilding the computer is now possible."
Haru froze, the cover of the magazine he was holding up hiding his expression.
"Tree diagram, huh? What is it? Is it important?"
"It was the super computer installed on the Orihime-1 satellite. It had enough computational power to track the movements of all molecules in the atmosphere and to use that data to perfectly predict a month's weather ahead of time. It was destroyed for unknown reasons back in July, and now that the remaining pieces are gathered back together, there is a possibility of the Sisters project reopening."
Wait, what?
"This tree diagram was behind the level 6 project?"
"Yes."
Well, that put a damper on his plans. That was something he had no idea about. Taking his silence as a sign to continue, Zaza resumed speaking. "Currently, there is a vehicle with the remnant stored inside headed toward the 23rd district."
"So, should I destroy it?"
"It is a bit too much for Misaka to ask of you, as that action would lead you to become a traitor to the city. But once the computer is reconstructed plans similar to the Radio Noise Project will form, harming other people."
Hidden behind the cover of his magazine, Haru gave a small grin.
Well, I was planning on betraying Academy City from the start.
"Give me all the information regarding the car that is holding the remnant." Haru got down from his bed. "I'll do something about it..."
The traffic signals within the city were out of whack, it seemed, and consequently the cars within the city had little to no movement at all; they honked their horns in their frustration. Leisurely walking, Haru headed toward the car in question, having memorized all the possible route—in effect, he had the entire map of the current district within his head.
Well, he would have to erase it later on due to shortage of mental space, but currently he knew where to go.
Spotting the white car containing the remnant ahead, Haru adjusted his pace to match other bystanders while casually observing the car. There was a total of about four people within it, all dressed in sharp black suits. There was no doubt about it; that car contained the pieces of the supercomputer.
He had the general idea of what to do set up within his mind, but he didn't really know what to do at that moment. Charging in right now would be suicide. Thankfully, the traffic impeded their speed, which gave him time to think.
Well, he had time to think.
Out from nowhere a group of people approached the unsuspecting vehicle and forcefully opened the door to the car; knocking out the people inside they began to ransack the contents within. People around the area retreated and Haru followed suit in order to keep the suspicion away from himself. Nevertheless, he held a careful eye on the burglars.
Looks like other people had similar ideas in mind...
For each and every one of his plans he set up had a predicted contingency, which he called "Route". When his plans went into motion, multiple factors became involved and Haru set up his plans accordingly in order to have multiple options. In this case his Plan A was taking Route C, which was someone else attempting to take the remnant by force. Now what he needed to do was to steal the suitcase containing the computer and frame this particular group of people.
It was easier said than done, of course.
Hiding himself behind multiple buildings Haru followed the retreating group of people. They were headed toward underground, presumably to avoid surveillance.