Accel World Vol 8 Chapter 11 (1/2)

Chapter 11

At the same time his Over-Ray disappeared, Haruyuki’s wings returned to their original metallic fins. They were folded automatically and were stored in the interior of a cover-shaped protuberance. After softly casting words of grat.i.tude in the back of his mind to his twin wings, Haruyuki looked at the faces of his comrades anew in order.

As if they had seen through Haruyuki crying on the inside of his mirror surface visor, all of them were laughing kindly with smiles. However, just now it seemed that there was no need to look down to hide his embarra.s.sment. The reason was that the existence of the miko smiling in front of him was the realization of an indescribably huge miracle.

That was right. The «world-destroying conflagration miko» Ardor Maiden, who had been sealed at the south gate of the Imperial Palace in the Unlimited Neutral Field over a period of two years, had been released at last now. At this rate, if they moved a mere hundred meters south and pa.s.sed through the portal established in the inner court of the triangular building—the real-world Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, Utai would be able to return to the real world normally together with her own alter ego.

“…You’ve done it, Haru.”

The one who had said that anew with a smile was Lime Bell—Chiyuri. Gazing at her eye lenses, which were filled with transparent drops, with an effort Haruyuki returned some words.

“Unh. —Thank you, Chiyu. Thank you, everyone…”

That moment, he seemed about to have the power drain straight out from his legs and sink to the floor there, but hurriedly he replanted his feet. It was too early to feel exhausted. There still remained one, no, two things he needed to do.

First, the purification of the «Disaster Armor» dwelling within Haruyuki. If they succeeded in that, the fear of being designated with a bounty by the Six Kings would also disappear. At the same time, the repeating disaster cycle would also finally be cut off.

When the purification ended, the joint training with Sky Raker’s «child», Ash Roller, who desired to acquire the Incarnate system, was waiting next. He could not even imagine what kind of Mind Power Ash would embody, but no doubt with a showy technique he would cause everyone’s nerves to—…

“H, huh?”

Having thought that far then, Haruyuki finally noticed that the skull face of that end-of-century rider did not exist before his eyes. Shaking off the tears br.i.m.m.i.n.g in his eyes by blinking, he turned to Fuuko and asked.

“What’s happened to Ash-san? He met up in front of my apartment house in Suginami and came this far together with us, right? …Ah, surely he didn’t get cold feet from seeing Suzaku and run away or something…”

He had added the end of his sentence thirty percent in seriousness and seventy percent as a joke, but however Fuuko did not laugh. Far from that, she bit her lip, and a seemingly anxious tint rose up in her eye lenses.

“…About that, the truth is…we, we were not able to meet up with that child.”

“Eh…wh, what do you mean…?”

Ash Roller should have dived from Fuuko’s car parked in the underground parking lot of Haruyuki’s real-world apartment house. The horizontal-direction distance between them was nearly zero. It seemed easy to meet up in front of the building.

Tak.u.mu explained it to the bewildered Haruyuki in a reserved voice.

“About that, Haru. In front of the apartment house, there were only tire tracks seemingly left behind by Ash Roller’s bike; no matter how many dozens of minutes we waited, the person himself didn’t appear…”

“Tire tracks…? Then, did he move to the Imperial Palace by himself, unable to wait…and get lost on the path somewhere…?”

“No…that’s difficult to consider.”

This time, Fuuko lightly shook her head.

“That child should know the route from Suginami to the imperial residence well. The path of the Demonic City stage is also easy to understand; it seems unlikely that Ash got lost.”

“Besides that, Haruyuki-kun. We tentatively did try to follow the tire tracks as much as we could, but it seemed that they kept going south from the apartment house.”

Kuroyukihime murmured that while crossing the swords of her arms before her chest. True enough, that was out of the ordinary. If one were to head for the imperial residence from Suginami, then even if one went south one would have to turn to the east soon.

Suddenly—.

An apprehension that seemed to block his breathing a.s.saulted Haruyuki.

Ash Roller did have his whimsical points, but he was not the guy to stand someone up. In the first place, his master and parent Sky Raker was also included among the people he had arranged to meet. Even if he saw small-cla.s.s enemies that seemed easy to defeat from afar, it was unthinkable that he would do something like chase after them with his bike.

In that case—«something» had happened. Probably, while standing by in the underground parking lot. Due to a situation so urgent he could not even wait to join up with Fuuko and the others, Ash had run south. And then, there a further something had occurred.

Also, two and a half hours had already elapsed since Haruyuki and company had dived into the Unlimited Neutral Field. And then if Ash had dived a mere minute earlier than the appointed seven o’clock in the evening, it would amount to a calculation of him having already spent ten-odd hours in this world.

“Uh, um…I’m, going to look for him!”

Driven on by an ineffable unease, Haruyuki again widened the metal wings on his back. Using his special technique gauge, which had been charged again during his battle in s.p.a.ce with Suzaku, he lightly floated up.

“Haruyuki-kun, operating solo is dangerous! If we’re to search, then together with everyone…”

“I’ll be fine, if I find something I’ll return! Senpai, you and the others, please wait in front of the Metropolitan Police Department’s portal!”

Interrupting the words of Kuroyukihime, who had tried to curb him, Haruyuki took an even higher alt.i.tude.

“…Haru, if you don’t return after we’ve waited for an hour, we’ll pull the cable on the other side!”

While giving a forced laugh at Chiyuri’s words, Haruyuki nodded, shouted just “Understood, I’ll leave it to you!”, and rose to a greater alt.i.tude in one go.

Presuming that Ash Roller had headed south from Koenji, he should be southwest of the Imperial Palace. From about fifty meters from the ground, he tried to strain his eyes, but there were many tall buildings in the Demonic City stage, and he could not see through. While raising his alt.i.tude further, he began to move slowly.

From the south of the Imperial Palace, basically Kasumigaseki, Haruyuki moved in a straight line to Akasaka and Aoyama. While flying, he scanned with all his might, but all that moved were small~medium-sized enemies. He thought about interrogating enemy hunting parties if there were any, but perhaps due to the fact that it was a weekday night, not a single sound of combat reached him.

Even if he strained his ears, he could only hear the sound of the wind blowing across the stage. However, that stillness further stirred Haruyuki’s anxiety. Although he was flying at the bare minimum energy-conserving speed, moment by moment his special technique gauge decreased. And being able to use his new Incarnate technique that had just spiritually awakened a while ago, «Light Speed», was very unlikely in this state of mind.

“…Guess it can’t be helped…”

Resolving himself, Haruyuki ran the risk of being discovered by hostile existences on the ground and raised his alt.i.tude. Before he was aware of it, he had reached Harajuku. Ahead here was already Yoyogi Park1, and south of that was s.h.i.+buya.

And then—at that moment.

Smack-dab in the middle of the wide intersection where Meiji-dori2 and Inokas.h.i.+ra-dori crossed, he had the feeling that something had gleamed with a flicker. Even if he looked down again, there were neither Burst Linkers nor enemies, but just in case he opted to try descending.

Haruyuki, who had landed on the blue-black surface of the road while being cautious about his surroundings, reached his hand down to his feet and picked up the thing that seemed to be the source of the reflected light.

At first glance, it was an unidentifiable object. There was an orange hemisphere-shaped clear lens fit in the silver disk about four centimeters in diameter. There was a thin rod extending from the side of the disk, but it seemed to be snapped halfway.

“…What the heck is this…”

He murmured and twirled the mysterious part in his hand; it reflected the faint sunlight of the Demonic City stage and flickered periodically in an orange color.

That moment—Haruyuki noticed it.

This was a bike winker. To be precise, it was the very winker part that Ash Roller had made blink in order to pull a feint on Haruyuki in their duel conducted this morning on the Loop 7 road.

In the Unlimited Neutral Field, objects missing from Enhanced Armaments remained for a fairly long time compared with those in the normal duel field. Some accident had probably happened when Ash Roller’s bike was pa.s.sing by here, and the blinker had been damaged. Looking around at his surroundings again with that conviction, he discovered some damage tracks burnt black on the surface of the walls of the buildings lined up along the south side of the road.

The orientation of the attacks was from north to south. Basically, Ash had driven from Loop 7 to this place via Inokas.h.i.+ra-dori, at that point had been attacked by someone, and had turned south at the intersection…?

Still gripping the winker part, Haruyuki kicked the ground and flew up. The level of the dread filling his heart had already reached the area around his throat.

At the bare speed such that his gauge did not decrease steeply, he flew south along Meiji-dori. In doing so, in a mere two twenty seconds the next fallen object caught his eye. He descended to the ground and made sure of it.

There was no longer the need to be perplexed about what that was. A hub and rim fixed in place with a thin spoke. In its vicinity, a gray, thick rubber wheel. It was a bike tire. From its width, it was the front wheel.

The same black traces of attack as those he had seen a while ago were concentrated on the surrounding ground. It seemed that here the bike had taken big damage, its front wheel had fallen out, and its experienced rider had headed south furthermore with a wheelie. However, that trick play would not continue forever.

“…Ash-san…!”

Haruyuki let out a hoa.r.s.e voice and looked out to the far side of the road that extended south.

A faint sound of impact rocked the air at that time.

The surface of the walls of a ma.s.s of buildings about a hundred meters ahead shone in a flickering green color. The hard sound and the brilliance were not the explosion of an object or an attack effect. It was the death effect of a duel avatar.

“……!!”

Haruyuki, who had reflexively begun to run, switched to flying midway. He flew over the roof of the buildings and took a shortcut past the road, which gently curved left. The instant the road in the neighborhood of Miyas.h.i.+ta Park3 in the s.h.i.+buya ward entered his field of vision, a profound s.h.i.+ver a.s.saulted Haruyuki’s entire body. His wings stiffened and arbitrarily hovered about twenty meters high in the sky.

What his eyes caught straight away was the mercilessly destroyed object whose tire, engine, frame, and m.u.f.fler were strewn about that previously used to be a metallic gray American bike.

A bit ahead from there, six Burst Linkers were standing in a ring. Of course, there were not any with whom he was friendly; there were hardly even any whose names he knew. What was common to the six was that thin auras of darkness were rising from their whole bodies. The Over-Rays of Mind Power. The sources of their energy were—the «eyes» glittering red like blood in the center of their chests. The «ISS Kits».