"Right. Sorry for intruding, Claudia."
I unlocked the door to Claudia's apartment with a hand that was now completely accustomed to the motion.
She had given me a spare key for this whole operation. Talking about the experiments outside was a bit risky. In a café, you never know who might be listening in.
So, the safest place was our own homes, which is why we'd been holding our strategy meetings and status updates in Claudia's room.
The reason my place was a no-go is obvious, so I won't get into that.
Because of this, I'd been coming to her room almost every day for the past week. Today, I'd destroyed all the labs we'd targeted and stopped by to confirm our plans for tomorrow.
It was already 2 a.m. I was so grateful to Claudia for staying up with me so late every night.
"...Huh, Claudia?"
No answer.
Usually, she'd reply as soon as I opened the door. Maybe she went out... at this hour?
"No way..."
I shifted my focus and moved forward.
It had been eight days since we started raiding the labs. The number of facilities we'd destroyed was already more than I could count on my fingers and toes. It wouldn't be surprising if someone from the "dark side" had identified me and was coming to attack.
Claudia, as my collaborator, was definitely a target as well.
I'd opened the door and called out normally, so if someone was in the room, they'd already know I was here. Still, I cautiously moved ahead.
I came to the largest room, the living room where we always held our discussions.
And there—Claudia was asleep, slumped over the desk.
She didn't look injured; she was just sleeping. She wasn't lying down, so she didn't seem to be having a good dream. She looked a little restless.
On the desk were stacks of documents, an open terminal, and Claudia's device (the one she used to cast magic).
It was a rare device. About five centimeters thick, a palm-sized rhombus with two eye-like ornaments. They were the same shape but different colors. Two of them made one set.
At this hour, it was natural to get sleepy. But we still had to confirm tomorrow's plans. I felt bad, but she had to push through a little longer.
"Sorry, Claudia. Could you wake up for a second?"
I hesitated for a moment but gently shook her shoulder. If she slept there and caught a cold, or got a stiff neck, it would be a pain.
She responded right away to the shaking. Her sleep wasn't very deep.
"Ugh, ah, mm...?"
Her eyelashes fluttered slightly, and...
"––––––"
"Tch!?"
The next instant, I instinctively pulled back.
My bangs, which couldn't keep up with my movement, became a little shorter.
By the time I'd stepped back, Claudia's second strike was already closing in.
"W-wait...!"
Before she could cut me, I took refuge in the spin of ACT3's Claw Flicker.
I thought I'd get some distance and reset, but it wasn't that easy.
"Whoa, ah!?"
She had perfectly timed her strike to my exit from the spin. I'd shifted my position and my timing, but I was just a hair's breadth away from having my head separated from my torso.
I couldn't feel any killing intent from Claudia. But her aim was precise and she showed no hesitation. In fact, she kept thrusting her blades forward as if she'd read my movements.
The rhombus-shaped devices were active, with hilts and blades appearing. The twin swords were what had been targeting me.
The blades were translucent magical energy. Their two trails drove me into a corner.
"Damn it...!"
I'd been focused on escaping without counter-attacking, but I was finally backed against a wall. It looks like I have to fight back...
"CLAUDIA!!"
"Gah!? Sh-Sho...!? Oh! S-sorry! What have I...!"
Just in the nick of time, she stopped.
The two raised swords hung in mid-air as if bound by something. As the strength left Claudia's fingers, they fell to the floor, obeying gravity.
Finally, she seemed to have come to her senses. Her eyes regained life. The color returned to her previously expressionless face, and as she understood the situation, she turned pale.
"First, put your weapons down. Then, calm down and explain."
It seemed like it was going to be a while before we could sleep.
I said that with certainty.
---------
We sat at the table as usual. In front of us were two freshly brewed cups of tea.
With everything prepared like this, Claudia would normally start talking cheerfully, but not today. She was looking down, deep in thought.
We'd sat down facing each other like this on purpose. And since it was Claudia, she would probably gather her thoughts before starting to speak. It was better not to rush her and just wait.
"Whew..."
My assumption was correct.
She raised her face, which was now completely serious. There was none of the playful expression she usually wore before getting down to business.
"I apologize for what happened earlier."
"Yeah. You're going to explain everything, right?"
"Of course."
Since it wasn't her intention, I wasn't bothered about being attacked, but I definitely wanted to know the reason. It seemed she had an idea herself.
"The device I have—'Pan-Dora'—is one of the Genestella Lux Ougaluxes."
The Genestella Lux Ougalux is one of the items from The Asterisk War.
The weapons used by the characters in Asterisk are called Luxes. They are weapons powered by a fictional mineral called Manadite.
They are crucial items that cause the supernatural phenomena in the story, like shooting beams of light or creating swords.
Among them, those using the highly pure Ulmus Manadite are the Genestella Lux Ougaluxes.
These weapons have a will of their own and choose their wielder. In some cases, they demand a price from their user.
But each one has a special and powerful ability, making them the signature weapons of the main characters.
In this world, however, the Genestella Lux Ougaluxes are a bit different.
First, the material Manadite doesn't exist. So, Ulmus Manadite doesn't exist either. The Genestella Lux Ougalux is a type of magic device.
Also, they have a clear developer: Tabane Shinonono, a character from Infinite Stratos.
Honestly, Tabane Shinonono is a person I wish didn't exist. She's at the top of my list of people to avoid. That feeling might be even stronger than my feelings toward Accelerator.
She's a troublesome "genius" or maybe a "natural disaster," who irresponsibly releases things into the world that even the engineers on this Academy Island can't create.
The great thing about the Genestella Lux Ougaluxes, which are the creations of this "natural disaster," is that they grant special abilities to someone even if they have no aptitude, as long as the weapon takes a liking to them.
It was a great invention that could destroy the existing power balance.
The Genestella Lux Ougaluxes were created for about a year, but then new ones suddenly stopped being announced.
What Tabane Shinonono does is ultimately just a hobby. No matter how groundbreaking a piece of research is, if she gets bored with it, she just discards it.
Because of this, their numbers are limited. Some of them are quite incomplete.
If she had continued her research, maybe the downside of having the weapon choose its wielder would have disappeared, and everyone could have had a special skill of their choice thanks to the Genestella Lux Ougaluxes.
Because she wields her overflowing talent as she pleases, the world has more anxiety than hope about her next move.
Countries are now desperate to secure her creations. They're trying to analyze them to develop them further. Not a single example has succeeded so far.
I've gone on for too long, but in short, Claudia possesses one of these precious Genestella Lux Ougaluxes.
The fact that she's bringing it up means it's related to the situation.
Her next question was a bit unexpected.
"Sho, have you ever experienced death?"
"Well, not really..."
I didn't die when I came to this world.
My reaction must have been what she expected, as Claudia chuckled and continued.
"I have already died over 1,200 times."
"Hmm? You look a bit too healthy to be a zombie."
"Of course, I haven't actually died. My Genestella Lux Ougalux—Pan-Dora's—ability is precognition. The price it demands from its user is to experience their own death."
Precognition. The ability to see the future.
And the price is... to experience your own death.
"Every time I sleep, I relive the moment of my death, which will one day come."
So, every dream she has is a nightMea.
"The nasty thing about this child is that it never shows me the same death twice. Death by illness, accident, freezing, burning, being crushed, suicide, death given by someone else. The possibilities are endless—that's a truly well-coined phrase, isn't it? I've experienced every kind of death imaginable. And they're all completely different. There might be similar deaths, but never the same scene. The worst one was... no, I'll stop there."
There was no need to bring it up and create a bad atmosphere. The information we needed was something else.
"Despite giving me this incredible ability of precognition, no one has been able to master it or wanted to use it. This is why."
"Well, if you're shown your own death every night, you'd go crazy."
Even Subaru from Re:Zero would be surprised.
"I hear that an average person can't last three days with it."
"Are you okay, Claudia?"
"You'd be surprised how easily you can get used to it."
"...Subaru never got used to dying no matter how many times it happened."
"Subaru...? Who is that?"
"Oh, just a character from a novel who has a similar special ability."
Aren't they similar? Well, Subaru's "Return by Death" is practically a form of precognition. The part about having to experience your own death is the same. The only difference is whether you die in reality or in a dream.
"Oh, what a shame. If he were real, I think we'd be good friends."
"I think you two are a bit too different."
Wait, Subaru doesn't exist in this world. Well, he's a regular person, so maybe he's not on this island.
"There are disadvantages like this, but in my dreams, I can move around quite freely. Since I'm going to die in the end anyway, I can conduct dangerous investigations and forcibly gather information... that's how I've been collecting the information I gave you."
"I see..."
But with a random dream, how could she pinpoint information about this specific incident?
"Didn't I tell you? Pan-Dora has a nasty personality. It can intentionally show me dreams. For the past few weeks, I've been having dreams about dying from the enemy's counterattack as a result of investigating this experiment. But no matter how hard I try, I can't get the most important information, the date of the experiment. It must be enjoying itself, watching us struggle."
"That's the worst..."
However, without Pan-Dora, we wouldn't have been able to gather any information at all. Mikoto Misaka, who can gather information and carry out her plans all by herself, is truly on another level.
"And when I'm dreaming, outside contact can trigger a kind of sleepwalking. The desperate movements of my body right before I die can manifest in reality. So I try my best to sleep alone..."
And this time, I had walked in.
"I am truly sorry."
"No, it's okay if that's the case. I'm sorry for trying to wake you up so abruptly."
Claudia has accepted Pan-Dora, and I need its power. For now, that's enough. For now.
The conversation about this ended here. We moved on to talk about work.
"According to the information I was able to gather in my dreams, there are only two labs left. However, this time, I don't know which one Ms. Misaka will go to. By chance, we'll definitely run into her."
"Finally..."
The Railgun, Mikoto Misaka. The third-ranked esper. If we become her enemy, we'll be easily defeated if we take her lightly.
"The showdown is tomorrow. The outcome of tomorrow will change the situation."
"Yeah. I'll put my all into it tomorrow."
From there, we moved on to our detailed strategy meeting.
---------
In a dimly lit lab, five researchers were working frantically. The reports flying in daily were about related labs being attacked one after another.
The experiment itself was progressing smoothly, but the cries of distress from various places were causing chaos.
Into this fire, two figures in lab coats entered.
One was a beautiful woman. Her flowing blonde hair and curvaceous body were visible even under her lab coat. She would look more at home wearing trendy clothes and posing for a camera than facing a PC in a dusty room.
The other was an old man, a stark contrast to her. His back was starting to stoop and his hair was thinning. He was old enough to have retired. But his unsettling, swirling eyes showed that he was no ordinary person.
"Everyone, how's the progress?"
"Dr. Kihara, Dr. Lunatique...!"
"There's no need to panic. You don't have to worry about Mikoto Misaka."
"But in addition to Mikoto Misaka, there's the unidentified invader. The Authority has also started sniffing around..."
A young researcher spoke with difficulty.
"Yes. But it's not a problem. Even if the labs are crushed, it doesn't hurt us one bit. What they were doing was just grunt work anyway."
"As long as our brains are safe, there's no problem. But, hmm, yes. I'll take care of the Authority."
He would apply pressure to delay the investigation. They couldn't be held off forever, but he could buy enough time to eliminate the invader. After that, they just needed to pin the blame on a convenient scapegoat, and it would be over.
"As for Mikoto Misaka, we'll deploy a suitable team. The opponent is the third-ranked esper... in that case, it would be best to send in 'ITEM'."
"Ah, the fourth-ranked wouldn't guarantee a victory, and they'll do their job more reliably than the second-ranked, who's been a bit rebellious lately. But you know it would be troublesome if Mikoto Misaka were to be openly targeted, right?"
"If that happens, a cover-up will be difficult. Of course, we'll be thorough."
In the woman's hand were two objects, red and blue, shaped like a watch.
--------------------------------------------
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