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  The flowing lines of a silhouette that was easily over five times the total length of the giant turtle. Twisting the sharp form of its torso, like a kind of shell or blade, it charged forward at high speed, as if swimming through the sea of grass. The massive body was twenty meters long, propelled by four legs growing from the bottom of the torso. The legs were short, but the bulging, tough muscles indicated it was far stronger than the tortoise. Thick, sharp claws dug firmly into the earth and flew up again, sending the giant shooting forward. The long tail stretching out behind it barely seemed to touch the ground.

  The snout tapered like a lance, with emotionless, lens-like eyes shining red on either side. Beneath these, an enormous mouth slowly opened and closed. Each time its jaw moved, countless white fangs—each one a large sword—came into view before being hidden again.

  Although its general form was close to a crocodile, it was obviously different. This creature was better called a dinosaur. Naturally, it was an Enemy like the tortoises running around trying to escape, but its size and its sense of presence were orders of magnitude different. There was no doubt that this was one of the strongest despots in the Accelerated World, beyond even the Beast class: Legend class.

  An armor of scales completely covered the massive frame, glittering blue-black as the dinosaur charged through the grassland with terrifying speed. In a flash, it drew in closer to the herd of desperately fleeing Armor-Clad Tortoises, and then leapt up high when it was on the verge of a rear-end collision. In the air, it opened wide its maw lined with sinister fangs and dived down at an extreme angle. When it landed, an incredible impact rang out through the stage, and from the middle of the dust that puffed up thick like smoke, its tapered muzzle appeared.

  Trapped in its enormous mouth was a miserable tortoise, held fast by its shell, so that no matter how it kicked its legs, it couldn’t escape. The eyes of the dinosaur glittered a deep red, and the muscles around its jaw twisted. The fangs piercing the metallic shell of the turtle sent a waterfall of orange sparks flying.

  Krrrk. A sharp, dry sound. At the same time, the tortoise’s movements stopped. One, then two fine cracks raced out over its thick shell. These immediately covered the turtle’s entire body, and a pale blue light spilled out from inside.

  In the next instant, the Wild Enemy Armor-Clad Tortoise, in the maw of the predator, transformed into thousands of shards of glass, burst apart, and scattered into the void.

  Its teeth came down with a klak, and the corners of the mouth of the enormous dinosaur twisted slightly before it started racing across the plain once more. The starved red eyes picked out its next prey from among the herd of lower-level Enemies fleeing in the grass. As it gradually gained speed, a dorsal fin like the sail of a yacht popped up high on its enormous back. In front of the fin, there was another, smaller projection.

  This was not an original organ of the dinosaur. The foreign object was another species of moving object. However, it wasn’t another Enemy parasitizing it. The figure, a total of a meter and a couple dozen centimeters tall with only two legs, was clearly a person—in other words, a duel avatar. This rode on the head of the Enemy it should have clashed with, as the dinosaur swam through the sea of grass, not even attempting to shrug the small person off.

  The duel avatar’s hands hung loosely, gripping a thin chain that stretched out for a few meters on both sides, linking the zone from the dinosaur’s jaw to the top of its head. The sight was almost that of a rider on a horse holding the reins. With the mysterious Burst Linker on its back, the enormous dinosaur charged forward toward the horizon in search of more slaughter.

  A minute or so later, when the sea of grass returned once more to silence, a small figure slowly rose up from its depths. This was also a duel avatar. The design was simple, with a basic theme of straight lines, but the armor was a deep red. It should have been conspicuous in the green grass; there must have been a reason why the dinosaur missed seeing it.

  The avatar stared for a while with fierce eyes in the direction the dinosaur had gone. But finally, it let out a small sigh and turned around. Once he or she walked off in the opposite direction from the dinosaur, the world was once again filled with only the quiet sound of the wind. Nothing further appeared to disturb it.

  5

  Of the 120 Umesato Junior High eighth graders, the sixty-one who had chosen the Henoko/Yoron Island plan were staying in a large resort hotel with over four hundred guest rooms. Built facing the wide, shallow beach of the cape that was once known as Camp Schwab, the northern windows had a view of the deep green of the peak of Henoko, while the southern windows looked out over the far-reaching Pacific Ocean.

  However, stepping out of the elevator, Kuroyukihime moved briskly down the hallway without so much as a glance at the windows. As she approached 728, the room she had been allocated, a window to lock and unlock the door was displayed on her virtual desktop. The icon blinking to the right of the window indicated that the person she shared the room with was inside.

  She stopped in front of the thick natural-wood door and took a deep breath before knocking twice. “Megumi. It’s me. I’m coming in,” she said to the intercom window that opened automatically, and without waiting for a reply, she unlocked the door, turned the knob, and opened it.

  The ocean-view room, slightly luxurious for junior high students on a school trip, was dim. All the lights were off, and only the gold of the sea melting in the evening sun pushed through the lace curtain on the southern window.

  The room ran long from north to south, with two beds lined up against the western wall. In a pile, blankets decorated the bed farther in. On the side cabinet, there was a small purple paper bag.

  Kuroyukihime stepped onto the carpet in bare feet and crossed the room, coming to sit on the edge of the nearer bed.

  Curled up like a child beneath the blanket, Megumi was apparently not asleep; Kuroyukihime could feel the twitch of her body pulling back through the mattress. At this, so like a young child who had been hurt, Kuroyukihime’s heart throbbed sharply once more.

  I really know nothing about her. And I’ve never even tried to learn.

  Gritting her teeth with the pain of this awareness, Kuroyukihime opened her mouth. “I’m sorry, Megumi. I was a fool.”

  “That’s not it.” The response came from beneath the pile fabric sooner than she expected. “You didn’t do anything wrong, Hime. I…I just sort of assumed. I thought during this trip…for just these seven days, I could…have you all to myself.”

  After a moment of silence, Megumi tugged the edge of the blanket and pulled herself into an even smaller ball. “Ah, ha-ha-ha! What am I even talking about? I’m sorry, Hime. I always say this weird stuff. Just forget it. Forget the whole thing. It’s okay. I just need a minute and I’ll be back to my usual self…so…” Contrary to her words, the end of her sentence shook fiercely, as if it was dampened by tears.

  Kuroyukihime bit her lip hard, and, resolving herself, she turned around, got on top of the sheets, and placed her right hand gently on Megumi’s back. She softly stroked the slender, trembling body and murmured through the blanket, “Megumi. I want you to listen.”

  Changing her tone, she announced firmly, “What you said on the beach this afternoon was true. I…have another world where time flows differently from this real world.”

  Her friend was silent.

  “The first time I visited that world was seven years ago, when I was eight. I spent half—no, more than half of every day in that land. So much time that I started losing track of which one was the real reality.” Involuntarily, a small sigh slipped out of her.

  Without even noticing that Megumi’s body had stopped shaking at some point, Kuroyukihime continued her soliloquy, a story she had never revealed to anyone before. “And then, after I left my family home when I started junior high, it was unclear to me where I belonged, or what this existence of mine even was. Megumi, before, I said I was able to find my path once more because I met Arita last fall. But t
hat was half-right and half-wrong. Because, just like me, he is a resident of that world.”

  Perhaps she shouldn’t have been telling this to a non–Burst Linker like Megumi. But Kuroyukihime didn’t hesitate. Because she was certain that if he had been there, he would have said that she should speak everything in her heart.

  She took a deep breath and continued more briskly. “Megumi. The one who rescued me when I was simply lost and drifting right after starting at Umesato was you. Ever since you called out to me after the entrance ceremony and said we should have lunch together, you’ve kept me firmly connected to this real world. I lost many bonds with that world as intermediary, but I’m trying to bring them back to life a little at a time. The bond that connects me to this world, a friend, there’s only you, Megumi.”

  These words were all true, containing everything in her heart, but she didn’t know how much of it Megumi would understand, not knowing any of the details of the Accelerated World. In a certain sense, the words were selfish, good for her and herself alone. Because what she had just said basically meant that she was split between two worlds, and the bond with Megumi, the connection through friendship, was only with half of herself.

  However, precisely because they were such close friends, Kuroyukihime didn’t want to lie to Megumi. It was hard to brush away the bonds in the Accelerated World that she had lost in the past—the feelings inside her of wanting to again see Fuko Kurasaki and Utai Shinomiya and her many other comrades, of wanting to fight alongside them again. But those emotions, and the love she held, for Megumi Wakamiya were falsely similar. Because Kuroyukihime wanted Megumi not as the traitor of the Accelerated World, the Black King, but as a totally average middle school girl.

  Trying to communicate all this through their skin touching through the blanket, Kuroyukihime put all of her feelings into the palm of her right hand—what would perhaps be called her “will” in the Accelerated World.

  Finally, Megumi wriggled around, changed orientation, and exposed from beneath the white blanket a head of fluffy short hair. With the blanket wrapped around her like some kind of cloak, Megumi slowly sat up and faced Kuroyukihime. Kuroyukihime noticed that her eyes were wet and redly swollen and started to bite her lip.

  “Thanks, Hime. What you said just now makes me super happy. But…but…I’m sorry.” Her voice was once again mixed with tears to come.

  Kuroyukihime wrapped an arm around her slender body. “Why are you apologizing? There’s nothing you have to apologize for. I’m the one who forgot our promise—”

  “It’s not that.” Megumi shook her head quickly from side to side on Kuroyukihime’s shoulder. “It’s not about the souvenir. I…Honestly, for a long, long time now, there’s been something I needed to apologize to you for.”

  Two hands stretched out from beneath the blanket and gently wrapped around Kuroyukihime’s shoulders. Megumi pulled her face from her friend’s shoulder, and her eyes, filled with tears, blinked. The drops of water that spilled out fell onto the sheets, painting gray spots.

  “Actually, that time…I…” But before Megumi could get the rest out, an inorganic alarm blotted out all other sound. Simultaneously, a window calling the school trip executive committee to convene obscured the other’s face. The regular meeting with the teachers before supper was to be held in five minutes. The two members of the student council were also on the executive committee.

  Megumi squeezed Kuroyukihime’s shoulders hard once, and then relaxed her hands and pulled her body away. Taking a tissue from the sideboard, she wiped her eyes as she spoke. “Of course, we can’t skip this one, right, Hime? Just hold on a sec. I’ll be ready soon.” Her tone had basically returned to the usual voice of the student council secretary.

  Before Kuroyukihime could say anything to stop her, Megumi had slid off the bed and disappeared into the washroom. “Megumi,” she murmured as she turned her gaze to the sheets, where the stains from tears shed mere seconds earlier had already dried up and disappeared.

  When the buffet-style dinner started in the hotel restaurant, which they had rented out for an hour, Megumi was watching over Kuroyukihime with her usual care.

  Because Kuroyukihime’s staple food was the individual frozen dinners sold by a restaurant she liked in the house where she lived by herself, her diet was somewhat unbalanced. It wasn’t that she disliked any particular foods, she was simply not good with meals when she didn’t really know what something was. And there were more than a few unidentifiable objects of that nature in Okinawan cuisine, so caution was required.

  But Megumi took it upon herself to pile food up on Kuroyukihime’s plate, offering up explanations like “this is fu chanpuru, fried with eggs” or “it’s soup with nabera, sponge cucumber,” so Kuroyukihime ended up feeling bad if she didn’t at least put some of it in her mouth. But when she took her timid bites, everything was delicious, so before she knew it, she was eating heartily of all the dishes.

  The bath time after that followed the same pattern, all “I’ll shampoo your hair” or “I’ll wash your back” as if she were a child, to the point where Megumi even blow-dried her hair for her, and Kuroyukihime returned to their room, feeling slightly dizzy. She sat down on her own bed, and the instant she let out a sigh of relief, a bottle of mineral water was thrust before her.

  “Here, Hime.”

  “Th-thanks,” she said, accepting it. After taking three gulps of the nicely chilled water, Kuroyukihime was unable to contain the brief laughter that slipped out. “Ha-ha-ha! I feel like I’m back to being a little kid who can’t do anything.”

  “Well, that’s nice sometimes, isn’t it? At school, everything’s always so crazy with your work as vice president. Just rest your bones for the school trip at least.”

  “You say that, Megumi, but your work as secretary is just as crazy.”

  They looked at each other and grinned.

  Elections for the Umesato student council members were held every October, and Kuroyukihime and Megumi had taken part in the executive branch that took care of routine tasks in the second semester of their first year. Since Megumi had basically joined to keep her company, Kuroyukihime couldn’t help but feel ashamed deep down for keeping her true motives a secret all this time.

  She had no particular desire to serve the students at school as a member of the student council; she had simply wanted high-level access privileges for the in-school local net. In order to make Umesato a stronghold to protect her from the assassins of the Six Kings, a grasp of the in-school system was essential—that was it. Of course, she had no intention of neglecting her work as a member, but having said that, she had no lofty ideals.

  She would have to apologize to Megumi at some point—the instant this thought crossed her mind, the events of a few hours earlier came back to life in her mind, as though by association.

  Crying the first tears Kuroyukihime had ever seen from her, Megumi had said that there was something that she had needed to apologize for from way back. But she couldn’t think of a single thing that fit that bill. If it was something that was going to bother both of them like this, however, then she thought she had best ask right here, right now, and she recomposed her face, preparing to open her mouth.

  But. Almost as if guessing her mood, Megumi moved nimbly to her own bed and turned around to say, “’Kay, we’ve got lots to do tomorrow, so let’s just call it a day.”

  “Oh, uh…I guess so.” Kuroyukihime nodded, and Megumi ran a finger across her virtual desktop to lower the lights.

  Through the southern window, with the curtains still open, the light of the moon spilled in, far brighter than it ever was in Tokyo, and dyed the room a pale blue. Perhaps the moonlight of the southern land included a kind of magical wavelength, because her eyelids suddenly grew heavy.

  She fell back into bed as a strange sensation came over her, like her consciousness was being sucked directly downward. When she closed her eyes, a blanket gently covered her body, and a faint voice whispered in her ear, “
Good night, Hime.”

  6

  The following day, Wednesday, April 17, was also lovely.

  Henoko Beach had only opened for the season at the beginning of that month, but the temperature was already up above thirty Celsius before noon, which meant that the majority of the Umesato students had immediately jumped into the ocean. They all seemed to be having fun in their own ways, some riding swimming rings, others splashing each other with water, but as for Kuroyukihime, she was focused on relaxing beneath the beach umbrella just like she had been the previous day.

  “Ahhhh.” She let out a long sigh and picked up the glass of coconut milk from the table next to her, taking a sip. She nimbly recrossed the legs stretching out from her black swimsuit and pushed up her sunglasses as they started to slide down.

  “You totally don’t look like a middle schooler, Hime,” Megumi said, rolling her eyes in the deck chair next to her.

  “If this were a real piña colada”—Kuroyukihime flicked the large glass with a grin—“it would be perfect. We’re outside the view of the social cameras, though. How about we try ordering one?”

  “Then I’ll have a frozen margarita, thank you very much.”

  “Oh, we better give it up. It’s still too soon for margaritas.” She cleared her throat and glanced at her virtual desktop, noting that the time was only twelve thirty PM.

  The schedule for that morning had been very interesting, but rather hard. What with a trip to the Okinawa National Institute of Technology and a hike up to Henoko Dam, her health gauge had been fairly depleted. And that was not the only thing making her body heavier. At basically the same time she opened her eyes at the early hour of six, she got a dive call from Haruyuki Arita in Tokyo.

  In the VR space Kuroyukihime loaded, he first apologized for the sudden call before explaining that the reason for it was because it was hard to be so far away from her. Sensing a sadness in those words that pierced into her heart, Kuroyukihime had a hunch that this was not the only reason. She was sure that something was happening at the distant Umesato Junior High, sixteen hundred kilometers away. Something that was making the boy Arita suffer, backing him into a corner—probably something brought about by the Accelerated World.