[482] Direct Pointing (4)
"Either way, they're human!"
Mirka denied that Shirone's Spirit Zone was Elysion.
Anke Ra feared them—myths told of humanity, Gaia, that drove heaven to the brink of ruin. But in the end they lost the war and disappeared from the world, didn't they? It made no sense that a power with only fragmentary records would suddenly reawaken now.
"Do you really think some human could wield Elysion? Pathetic imitation."
As if to refute her, Shirone narrowed his eyes and fired a photon cannon.
The flash erupting close by made Mirka hesitate to trigger her Unregulated Form; she flung her body aside instead.
This is dangerous.
If the Immortal Function is infinite, Elysion is formless.
A mind perfectly merged with the outside treats every piece of information detected by the Ultima System as its own. It was as if Shirone's Spirit Zone had fused with ancient magic—Mirka was not fighting a single person named Shirone, but a system.
To any conscious being, the Ultima System's direct pointing was an utterly alien phenomenon. That completely different combat framework threw the fairies into chaos, and the magic Shirone wielded while adapted to Elysion began to devastate everything with even greater destructive force.
I have to stop it here.
After watching seven fairies vanish in barely ten seconds, Mirka finally steadied herself.
Whether what Shirone used was true Elysion or an imitation, the power itself was real.
"Follow me!"
Mirka took the lead and flew; Shirone answered from behind with photon cannons, showering flashes as if throwing rapid punches.
At the same time, Mirka's Unregulated Form—the Razor of Truth—activated.
A chilling white light shimmered around her as mass-bearing photons struck her body.
KRA-THOOM!
All the fairies who knew the Unregulated Form paused their fighting to watch the result. Shirone studied Mirka with a cold, sharp gaze.
"Hu—hu-huh."
Mirka smiled and extended a hand, composed.
She was upper-echelon even among fairies; the power of her incarnation still gave her the advantage. But her smile was so tense it was almost rigid.
"I win."
In any case, as long as the Unregulated Form was active, Mirka was invulnerable to Shirone.
She activated another Unregulated Form—the Law of Obedience—and surged forward at tremendous speed.
"Tch!"
Shirone spread his light wings wide and shot into the sky. All the fairies launched vertically; in an instant they left Whale's Valley and broke into the open firmament.
"Grab him! If we catch him, we win."
A hail of spells rained into Shirone's view.
They varied by the fairies' birth-concept—visible and invisible, material and phenomenal—but Shirone didn't fixate on any one type; he simply stared straight ahead.
Elysion integrated all information one-dimensionally and delivered it, and Armand's powerful functions drove Shirone's reflexes to the extreme.
This can't be…
Shirone's movements, dodging a barrage that seemed to have no openings, astonished even those fairies born with flight. He slipped through a magical web that no one could escape without calculating down to millimeters, then began his counterattack.
When Akamai's eye locked onto a target, photon cannons struck from all directions in concentrated fire. Whenever Antithesis's focus leapt between fairies, they fell without fail.
"What are you doing!"
Mirka roared as she flew in; Shirone paused his assault and watched her.
Stay calm. Think.
Shirone knew Mirka was in an invulnerable state, but he didn't sink into despair like before. Every Unregulated Form carried activation conditions and a cost.
You can't become invulnerable just by stopping a single first strike.
The first thought was temporal constraint. She couldn't maintain invulnerability forever. But that alone wasn't enough.
Because the advantage was so great, Shirone could actually make clearer judgments.
Spatial constraint.
Reaching that conclusion, Shirone angled sharply to avoid Mirka's rush. He watched Mirka strain to track him with her eyes and gained a measure of confidence.
I see. In her sight…
With a brilliant movement that pushed his light wings to the limit, he disrupted Mirka.
"Hah! Clever idea, but—"
Countless enemies had tried to break the Razor of Truth. But that was a misconception that focused only on removing variables. Think a little differently, and you can see why Mirka gained this power.
She ranked third among countless fairies. Mirka had been strong from the start, and the Unregulated Form was merely a tool to preserve that strength one hundred percent.
"Do you dare try to shake me off?"
Mirka turned to light and pursued Shirone.
She charged with terrifying speed, aiming to pierce the body of the Shirone bound by the Law of Obedience and drive through him.
Bang! A sound erupted as Mirka's attack passed through Shirone—only Mirka's eyes registered a shock.
"What—?"
Shirone vanished.
Not a coordinate shift; he literally disappeared.
A gust of air sliced past Mirka's ears and she spun to the side in alarm. Shirone's tendrils were approaching at high speed.
Having lost him from sight, Mirka's Unregulated Form reset. Clenching her teeth, she snapped her upper body aside.
Guhk! The blast shoved her several meters backward.
Shirone didn't stop at swinging tendrils; he followed up with photon cannons. Even as Mirka became light and traced complex trajectories to dodge, questions flooded her mind.
How on earth did he slip out of my sight?
"Razor of Truth!"
Regaining enough composure, she reactivated the Unregulated Form.
The photon cannons vanished futilely, and realizing she was invulnerable again, Mirka glared at Shirone.
Valhalla Action.
The fallen angel's magic circle spread behind Shirone—and in that instant everything became clear.
Oh no…!
Cause and effect had been reversed.
If he had already reached a certain coordinate and then inverted time, she couldn't lock Shirone within her sight.
This lets me avoid being trapped by the Unregulated Form. But I must hold back from major attacks.
Shirone, too, paid for reversing causality: a delay in action. Mirka had to be struck at least once to trigger the Unregulated Form, and if Shirone miscalculated his delay he would be bitten as well. They were forced to watch each other.
Still, this destroyed the Unregulated Form's outrageous advantage and balanced their strengths.
Shirone fought desperately amid the fairy ranks.
Though it was one against many, the tide was slowly turning in Shirone's favor. The formless magic born of Elysion allowed no time for adaptation and steadily cut down enemies. Finally, his finishing laser net unfurled.
A web of red lines—possible only because it had no center—spread outward and obstructed the fairies' movements. Whenever a homing photon cannon slipped through the mesh and detonated a foe, screams echoed across the sky.
"You pathetic human!"
As Mirka activated the Razor of Truth, Shirone's Valhalla Action triggered and his form vanished.
Find him!
Mirka craned her neck and scanned frantically. If she could spot him before Shirone's delay ended, she would win.
Huh?
She turned—and her eyes trembled in shock. Shirone had drawn much closer than she'd anticipated.
His whirling tendrils were brutal, but not beyond Mirka's skill to evade.
Foolish human. Let impatience make a reckless move?
Mirka sneered and reached out her hand. If she could just block him with the Unregulated Form, Shirone would be completely exposed.
Guhk!
But just as she prepared to trigger her ability, a powerful binding force seized her and she convulsed.
Akamai's eye, embedded beside the artificial brain on her flank, was aimed at her.
Valhalla Action's power could reverse the causality of all linked events. In other words, Shirone had split the outcome into two: one where he appeared on her flank, and another where he returned to her rear to strike—both accelerated to occur simultaneously.
That lengthened his delay, but it was a variable Shirone created to break the tight balance.
So there is no absolute result?
As that thought formed, a sickening crack rang in Mirka's head.
Her skull caved in. She was hurled into the distant sky, and when inertia ended she traced a parabola and fell.
"Mirka!"
All the fairies afloat in the sky could not believe what they saw. A noble geist of the second rank among the seventy-two grades of fairies—annihilated by a mere human. Rage at their species' pride being trampled surged, and every fairy rushed in.
Graaah!
Shirone grimaced and waited for the delay to end. Because he had reversed two events, his wait time was far longer than usual. By the time the delay released, countless spells were already surging toward him.
I have no choice.
It wasn't his usual way, but this was war. For victory, brutality was sometimes necessary.
Through Elysion's mental power, Shirone unleashed one of his specialties: Rampage.
But this Rampage had a completely different temperament from anything he'd shown before—a literal, multiplied eruption of Rampage. Because Elysion had no center, Rampage detonated in numerous places.
If his previous Rampage merely repelled things, this time veils of light surged from every direction to suffocate.
KRA-THOOM—KRA-THOOM!
"Kyaaaaah!"
All the fairies trapped within Elysion's influence screamed horribly. Small bodies caught between the veils creaked and snapped. From afar it looked like sudden lightning storms raging across a clear sky.
Thirty-meter spheres of light flashed in succession, and fairies trembled like they'd been electrocuted before tumbling down.
When the Elysion-exclusive Rampage ended, the sky was calm and blue again.
The fairy contingent was annihilated. Shirone hovered alone in the air, looked up into the higher heavens, and exhaled deeply.
His light wings folded with a snap, and his body began to fall in place. As he plummeted toward the ground, Armand's robe extended, carrying him tens of meters forward to plant itself on the earth first. It absorbed the force so his body landed lightly, as if he'd leapt down.
He was on a mid-mountain slope, and below the range he could see Paradise where the citizens lived.
Haa.
Shirone sat for a moment and soothed his weary spirit. Armand's nerves vividly conveyed Peope's condition tucked in his embrace.
How strong have I become? he wondered briefly.
But what he felt most immediately was the devastation of mind and reality left by war.
I have to go further.
That was war. There was also something personal he still had to achieve.
"Hold on a little longer, Peope."
Once Armand restored some bodily function, Shirone rose again. He bent his knees slightly and a huge pair of light wings unfolded from his back.
With a rush of dust, Shirone leapt up and, speeding over the mountain range, flew toward Arabot.