[382] Vol. 16 - The Meaning of Survival (4)
* * *
Stage 3: Toxic Exposure.
It was a place where marshland stretched to the horizon.
At first everyone hovered in the air with Fly magic, but after inhaling the poisonous gas rising from the swamp they began to fall in, one by one.
The ordeal began then.
The students who fell into the bog screamed, their faces twisted beyond recognition.
It was unmistakably excruciating.
Those still in the air gritted their teeth and endured.
But everyone knew they would have to go in eventually.
The Association made that point with the survival program.
Nature's power cannot be overcome by magic. The strength to survive to the end lies not in magic but in the mage's will.
The students aloft began to retch.
Those in the swamp took the fumes, but they were no longer in any state to even notice that something else was falling.
"Ha."
Nade sighed. As his center of balance slowly tilted, he looked back at Shirone and said, "See you later, Shirone."
Once Nade began to fall, others followed in quick succession.
Shirone couldn't hold out any longer either. Collapsing, a drowsy voice slipped from his lips.
"Yeah... Nade."
* * *
One by one, the students who had failed the survival portion crawled out of the Virtual Zone.
They sat where their devices had dropped out, pressed ice towels to their heads, and tried to rest.
Kolly checked the Virtual Zone's dashboard and announced, "Extreme Cold program, Stage Three: Toxic Exposure, has ended. Current survivors: Red Team 8, Blue Team 7."
Olivia said, "Hmm, surprisingly many survived. This graduating class is stronger than I expected."
"That's because Class Three is full of solid students, and Fermi's group is still in it. Class Two doesn't have weaklings either," Alpheas added.
"Stage Four... 'Severance,' huh? This is where the balance will tip," Alpheas said.
Level Four was the difficulty the Magic Association set as the standard for certified mages.
Here it wasn't just pain—you experienced real death.
And dozens of times at that.
* * *
Whoooooosh!
Hearing wind vomited from the abyss, Shirone fell endlessly.
Compared with the extreme natural environments so far, Stage Four was a mechanical space.
He'd fallen into the interior of an enormous shaft whose bottom could not be measured.
Hundreds, thousands of blades whirred so tightly together there was no gap, shredding the students to pieces.
Death was something you could not adapt to.
Every time horrific, tragic sensations slammed into their minds, Spirit Zones broke and dropouts followed in waves.
Shirone bit down hard.
Had he been cut to pieces and reconstituted about ten times? It felt as if the test itself were asking, "Can you still endure this?"
Huge blades hung like trays, leaving afterimages as they waited. There was likely no way to pass alive.
"Endure! Endure!"
In an instant Shirone pierced through the blades' afterimages. But his body was already split into three pieces.
What do you call the feeling of watching two legs fall before the face?
There are dead people, but no one who has actually died; human language will never have a precise expression for that.
The others were the same.
They'd be stabbed by a blade sprung from the wall and fall for a beat, and when the blade withdrew they'd miserably move on toward the next death.
"Ugh—!"
Reassembled, Shirone inhaled air like a fetus taking its first breath.
"Ugh! Just kill me, kill me!"
Seeing dozens of drilllike blades meshed like teeth waiting like a floor, anyone would think that.
Thunk!
Shirone hit the place.
Tatter-tatter-tatter—
In an instant his body was shredded and poured down below like gore.
* * *
"Ugh! Damn it!"
Nade woke from the Virtual Zone in a foul mood.
Iruki, Amy, even Fermi's group had failed to endure Severance and been flung out, rolling on the floor.
Their heads throbbed and nausea surged. They gagged and then let out long, exhausted sighs.
"This is insane. Why do we always get stuck at Stage Four?"
Amy wiped her lips, her expression grim.
For a Spirit Zone to persist after death required an obsession that transcended life and death.
Seekers. Religious devotees. Murderers.
Whatever the case, from here on it was a realm beyond ordinary minds.
So it wasn't surprising Iruki had been eliminated.
"If you die, you die. What's next, anyway?"
He shouldn't force himself into a situation where he might die. That rigid, uncertainty-averse way of thinking couldn't accept this stage.
Severance met the Association's expectations.
A fair number of dropouts occurred at Stage Four, and most crawled out of the Virtual Zone with looks like the dead.
"Ow, I'm going to die. Hey, you okay?"
Nade rubbed the back of his neck and approached Iruki. Iruki looked back with a puzzled expression.
"Did you fall too?"
"Yeah. My head's killing me."
After thinking for a moment, Iruki asked again, "Why?"
"Why? What do you mean?"
Iruki had assumed Nade would pass Severance without trouble, but when he thought it through he accepted the possibility.
'Maybe that's the natural result?'
Nade didn't dwell on what comes after death. Perhaps he deliberately suppressed it.
If his mind were to cross beyond death, the normal human demeanor he currently had would never be possible.
"No matter. Let's get out. I feel like I'm actually dying."
Kolly looked to Alpheas and said, "In thirty seconds we'll enter Stage Five: Swarm. Shall I open the vision?"
"Hmm, Swarm..."
Having passed the threshold of a professional mage's "near-death" standard, they were entering a world that couldn't be defined by theory.
There was a real risk of permanent mental damage, so they needed to open the vision and check the students' states.
"Open the vision."
"Yes. Activating the master device."
Kolly manipulated the device and a large concave hologram appeared in the air of the Virtual Zone.
A huge hologram appears at the start of the graduation exam, and this vision rendered the program's internal situation clearly.
-Entering virtual Extreme Cold program Stage Five: Swarm.
"Ugh! What is that!"
When the vision showed the Swarm scene, the dropouts gathered in front of the Virtual Zone grimaced in horror.
A mass of disgusting insects writhed without end. Hundreds of millions of bugs surged like the earth itself moving.
Survivors were likely being buried and tortured by those insects somewhere in that place.
Stage Five: Swarm.
A realm of fear, disgust, and pain some would prefer to die rather than endure.
* * *
The sight of writhing bugs stirred a primal human fear, but this time it wasn't just something to watch.
They penetrated skin, nerves, and organs, delivering physical sensations.
The pain of creatures burrowing into every orifice and devouring flesh didn't end with death.
As the unbearable multiplied, piles of insect mounds began to shift.
Someone surrounded by crawling bodies of bugs suddenly bolted up and thrashed, screaming.
"Aaaah!"
Eider, who had collapsed in the Virtual Zone, seemed to take up that virtual scream.
"...Aaaah!"
He rolled on the floor, flailing his limbs and desperately trying to crawl somewhere.
"Waaah! Waaah! Waaah!"
No one helped him. Approaching someone in severe shock would only cause more trauma.
Still, maybe because of the talent that had carried him through Severance, Eider quickly regained composure.
"Huff! Huff!"
On the border between virtual and real, he looked around with a terrified face and began to tear up.
"Ugh, this is really scary."
"..."
Who wouldn't be terrified?
Those eliminated at near-death thought it fortunate they'd stopped at Stage Four after watching Eider.
Screamer's expression, however, was not good.
For survival assessment, Eider had been scoring well since last year—that was why they'd pulled him into Blue Team.
Yet he still couldn't get past Stage Five, and the one they most needed to watch—Shirone—was still in the Swarm.
'Eider couldn't endure it, and Shirone is holding on?'
Nade had the same thought. He watched the Virtual Zone with an ice pack at his neck and said to Iruki, "That Eider kid at least got to Stage Five, huh? For someone so young, not bad."
"He's still the youngest in this graduating class. Talent, if not skill, is undeniable."
The difficulty of the Swarm could not be compared to Severance. Starting with Eider, students were eliminated one after another.
Canis frowned, forced himself upright, and after a moment Arin slowly opened his eyes.
Unlike Eider, they calmly gathered their wits.
"Canis, you okay?"
"So-so. It's much tougher than I expected. The Spirit Zone gets too sensitive after Stage Four."
"There are too many insects secreting toxins. They get into the organs and keep striking, so maintaining immobility is hard."
'Talking about immobility in a situation like that. Are they insane?'
That was Arin's assessment, fitting for a specialist in mental disciplines, but students who'd been eliminated before near-death were dumbfounded.
With bugs tearing through intestines and talk of toxins and immobility, it was natural they'd sound insane.
But that was exactly why it was called a realm.
Depths that can't be measured by numbers are sensations you cannot understand without reaching them.
'They're all incredible.'
While the dropouts gathered at the Virtual Zone, Maya still remained in the rest area.
She had been the first to be eliminated and recovered the slowest; no one paid her any attention.
She could understand the ruthlessness of competition. What saddened her was that she wasn't even considered a competitor.
She approached Shirone's friends. They were the only ones who'd shown her kindness in the graduating class.
"Amy, are you okay? How's your head?"
Hearing Maya, Amy turned.
"Yeah. I think we're okay. How about you?"
"I'm starting to feel better. Sorry—I failed Phase Two."
Maya bowed apologetically. She felt bad for not meeting Shirone's expectations after he'd taken her onto the team.
"It's fine. I was shaken too. Don't worry about it."
Amy reassured her. Having known the pain of Phase Two, she couldn't blame Maya.
"But... is Shirone okay? He still hasn't come out."
Amy scanned the Virtual Zone. Everyone had been eliminated at Stage Five, and only the final two lay side by side.
Red Team's Shirone and Blue Team's Fermi.
"Anyway, the balance has held to the end. Whichever side wins over there takes the victory."
Maya looked at the vision floating in the air.
It was disgusting from a distance, but when the screen unfolded before her, nausea returned.
'How can anyone endure that place?'
Phase Two's ice alone had been terrifying for her. And yet someone was fighting in that horrendous place.
'I would've just died.'
Maya couldn't bear to look at the vision. Still, because Shirone—the one who had trusted her—was fighting, she couldn't look away.
"Th-There! Look!"
Boil pointed at the vision in shock.
The crawling mass of insects heaved, and Shirone slowly pushed himself up.
"My god..."
Maya's face went pale.
Others were struck dumb as well, staring blankly at the vision.
Shirone's appearance was almost unbearable to watch. Some parts had flesh completely stripped away, exposing bone; other parts had swollen, rotting skin.
Maya could not believe the human mind could withstand such a thing.
Shirone, drained of strength, let his arms hang limply and lowered his head.
He didn't even flinch when insects tore at his skin—an unmoving concentration that made the corner of Alpheas' mouth lift.
"Not bad. Perfect stillness of mind."
It wasn't that he didn't feel pain or disgust. It was an inhuman state of focus: maintaining absolute concentration no matter what.