That Winter (1)
Shirone and Minerva wandered the world searching for traces of .
"Target Revocation."
Minerva, sitting on the jet, said.
"They call it target revocation when the user's killing intent is reset. And when the short blade is destroyed."
Shirone picked up her words. " manifests in front of the person who is closest to being able to eliminate its target."
"But if a new user loses their nerve and refuses to kill the target, destroys itself and strips the user of it."
Shirone didn't know the rest.
"'s murderous intent is strong enough to warp the Law. When it reaches the point where it can't kill, it simply breaks. In human terms, it's like pent-up rage exploding."
"Hatred, then."
"Yes. If Target Revocation occurs, 's hatred is maximized. Even if Havitz is outside the Law, a in that revoked state would be a fearsome opponent." Shirone turned to face forward. "Where could it be?"
"Target Revocation is the ultimate function of . The downside is that it doesn't appear before people."
"Then there's no way to find it."
"It's difficult, but not impossible—this isn't like finding a needle in a desert. If had only just been born…"
Sadness clouded Minerva's eyes. "That area would already be scorched to ashes."
While Shirone's team worked to recover , the Ex-Machina team entered final preparations.
Thousands of sheets with algorithms were pasted across the walls, and the table was buried under stacks of documents.
"Alpha Fish—the pilot fish—goes into the tank first and creates an environment where the Beta Fish can live," Iruki said as she sorted papers.
"If Abela changed her mind, that means Havitz accepted her too," Guido, writing on the blackboard, added.
"If someone fated to be a witch can win Havitz's heart, then the strategy worked," he continued.
Iruki nodded. "I don't know how sincere Havitz is, but this will bind him to the Law to some degree. We made the Alpha Fish to create that environment."
"In exchange we lost Crouch, but…"
Iruki paused in mourning for a moment, then put the last document into the safe.
"What we have to do now is design the perfect Law to snipe Havitz before we retrieve ."
Agaya opened the door. "I've heard that a in Target Revocation doesn't merely twist the Law. It becomes the Law itself."
Guido, Mice, and Ness followed.
"Besides Gustav Unit Four, there are countless armored units and facilities protecting Havitz. As long as he lives in Marsack, assassination by conventional means is impossible."
A fortress no one but Alpha Fish could breach.
"Our job is to make a crack in that fortress."
Iruki, last to leave the room, reached the Ex-Machina device in the basement.
I will find that crack. Steam hissed as the door opened and the five greatest servants in the world entered.
East, the Moon Kingdom.
Moon, one of the Seven Kings, led the seven eastern realms apart from the Gincheon Empire. It was a nation at the cutting edge of spiritual arts.
"Ugh. I can see death—death is visible."
At the entrance to Chiak Mountain, the royal ritualist trembled, his hands clamped around a bell.
"We can't go any higher. From here on, all that awaits us is a darkness deeper than any abyss."
Chiak Mountain.
Its terrain had long made it uninhabited; fierce beasts guarded it and turned it into a natural stronghold.
"Hurry up. We're waiting behind you."
Minerva pointed to the long line of Moon Kingdom soldiers trailing behind them. "Are you really going? I'm the royal ritualist, but I can't hold back this presence."
Shirone looked up at the snow-covered mountain.
This is Minerva's… The murderous energy that once nearly drove him mad when he first met her now dominated the mountain.
"You should've reported this sooner if something like this happened. Kings—always," he muttered.
The disaster in the Moon Kingdom had begun two months ago, but the court had kept it quiet for diplomatic reasons. Villagers whispered that monstrous screams rose from the mountain day after day.
"It's the work of ," Minerva said, standing beside Shirone. "When a grudge formed from failing to kill its target keeps amplifying, it wipes out everything around it."
didn't even need to move. Most creatures would die from murderous intent alone.
"Let's go up. We need to see for ourselves."
They climbed along a path worn by mountain beasts, and Shirone found countless frozen carcasses piled with hoarfrost.
"They're all dead."
Herbivores—rabbits, deer—mid-mountain lay frozen without a single wound.
"Ugh! Ugh!"
Lower-ranked soldiers started retching, and even officers turned pale and gagged.
"We must stop here. We can't continue!"
The ritualist warned again.
"You lot are soft," Minerva snapped.
They were elite troops, but the presence of spread through the mountain was Minerva's.
"Wait here. Only Shirone and I will go up."
No one defied the command of the Five Greats, and the two passed the mid-slope and headed for the summit.
"My God…"
Across a plain where even grass had died, bodies of monstrous things—oni born of raw emotion, colossal beasts the size of houses—lay pierced and broken.
"They fought back," Minerva said. Her eyes had reverted to the look of a girl, and grief shadowed them. "At first the grass died, then the herbivores. When there was nothing left to kill, it roamed the mountain and stabbed at whatever it found."
Each corpse bore clear puncture marks. "Whether they were intelligent or not, instinct taught them that if they couldn't get rid of that sword that suddenly appeared in the mountain, everything would die. So they chased here, and…"
The result was annihilation.
"That was the hatred I directed at the world."
Just seeing Chiak Mountain told how terrible young Minerva's heart had been.
"And now it's become a shard that can't be destroyed and still wanders the world."
At the summit, lay stamped into the cold snow like a print. In the all-white landscape, only the area around shimmered violet.
Minerva reached out and grasped the short blade. "That's why—though I already gave it to you—a in Target Revocation can only be retrieved by me."
She had found .
"Minerva…"
As Shirone stepped forward to comfort her, a voice came from the far side of the mountain.
"You're late. With two busy Five Greats strolling together, perhaps your vigilance relaxed?"
Minerva's expression hardened at the sight of the man crunching across the snow.
"Mahoro Amanta." He was the Balance Bureau's Five Great—the one who turns the world-wheel.
"Shirone, this is our first meeting. I should offer congratulations, but I've been so busy."
Minerva reverted to her saintly bearing. "Calling him Shirone? He's one of the Five Greats, after all. And isn't it Shirone who huffs and puffs the most?"
Among the Five Greats, Minerva was the most casual with Shirone, but Amanta didn't care.
The Balance Great? Dark-skinned, shaved head, deep crow's feet marked by three lines beside his eyes.
Tiririririri! He snapped his middle finger and a small, cartwheel-shaped world-wheel whirred between his thumb and forefinger.
"So? What business would the busy Balance Great have here?"
"Now that the Buddha is gone, there's no counterpoint to universal love. I'm worried it might run rampant."
Minerva didn't give Shirone a chance to reply. "Your meddling is bigger than the universe. There's nothing to worry about; you're doing far better than we are."
"That doesn't look the same to me," Amanta said.
Tiririririri! The sound of a winding spring grated on Shirone.
"Shirone's universal love is merely the longing of some people—it doesn't represent the whole world."
In the end, Shirone stepped forward. "Isn't it enough if people can love one another without suffering?"
"No. It's not."
Amanta spoke with finality. "This world is merely the backdrop for life; there is no single rule dictating how one must live."
The Balance Bureau serves all the world's users. "Shirone, you are a time-breach user. Depending on how you use it, you wield a power capable of disrupting the world's order. So your universal love, without the balance of justice, is nothing but a foul play."
"You permitted the breach."
"The Buddha permitted the breach, but did not endorse you. That is why I intervened."
Minerva asked, "So? Do you mean to come at us, then?"
"I'm here to restore balance."
The world-wheel slipped from Amanta's hand and shot toward Shirone.
"Shirone! Dodge!" Minerva shouted, but Shirone—already furious—grabbed the wheel with his hand.
"Your claim is only one idea. I have no intention of bending my beliefs."
Amanta pointed at the sky and twirled his finger. "You are wrong. For me it's not a mere idea. I am activating the user-protection program."
"What does that—?"
"I am the one who realized the center of the universe," Amanta declared. "Therefore I have the authority to turn the world-wheel impartially."
"With that authority, I will seal your universal love."
"Shirone! Let go of the world-wheel!"
Before Minerva finished, the wheel in Shirone's grip began to spin at tremendous speed.
"Ugh!"
Amanta released Shirone. "No force can beat balance."
Shirone's wrist twisted, his arm warped, and finally his entire body began to rotate from his shoulder.
I'm being sucked in.
His body contorted as if wrung like laundry; the cartwheel swelled and the world itself spun. Light and darkness flashed before his eyes until his head reeled.
Hng! Hong! Hng! Hng! Hng!
When the sound of a gigantic blade turning filled the air, Shirone came to.
He was staring at the ceiling. A metal fan more than two hundred meters across was turning above him.
"Why have you come here, representative of mankind?"
An unknown tongue resolved into Ultima and the voice struck Shirone awake. He looked around.
He was in a domed chamber; the inner walls were engraved with wheel patterns.
"Where is this?"
The Terapos clerics surrounding him spoke in unison, "This is the Prison of Balance. A perfect isolation chamber that restrains those who violate the universe's balance."
"How long?"
"You have committed a temporal breach. You cannot leave this place until the Buddha returns."
"Send for the Chief Justiciar of Terapos."
"This is a perfect isolation chamber. It removes you from the Law—only you, the breaker of balance, exist here."
Shirone sighed. "The Buddha allowed the breach."
"We are the user-protection program. Our only duty is to isolate errors until system recovery is complete."
"No—no, that's not what I mean." Shirone shook his head and said again, "The breach… was permitted."
When the light of Yahweh rose above Shirone's head, the giant ceiling fan stopped.
Reverse it!
The fan began turning the other way and accelerated until a ring of light formed.
"Stop! If you break out of the Prison of Balance without authorization—!"
What would happen then?
There was no precedent; the Terapos clerics couldn't finish the sentence.
Grrrrr!
As the scene shifted and the world-wheel spun the opposite way, Shirone's body was restored.
"What did you do?"
Shirone spat the world-wheel into the snow and clenched his teeth. Amanta's eyes betrayed his shock.
"How did you escape…?"
Because the concept itself was imprisoned, even Yahweh shouldn't have been able to get out.
"No way."
Amanta suddenly realized. Only one possibility remained.
The system did not recognize Hexa as an error.