"What are you laughing at?! You heartless bastard! I don't know what magic you used to mess with my senses, but if I break free, I'll teach you a lesson! What do you know? Have you ever understood us?!"
Kanzaki Kaori's face burned with fury, her voice bordering on hysteric. Her pale cheeks seemed on the verge of shedding blood-red tears.
"Ha! Why would I need to understand you? I don't care to. I'm just annoyed at the nonsense data you spouted. It's like brandishing a sword in front of a master swordsman or carving wood before a master carpenter. The 103,000 grimoires take up 85% of Index's brain capacity? Should I say you underestimate humans or overestimate them?"
"Grimoires are the wisdom of ancient sages. A mere mortal trying to grasp them would go 'boom' and join those sages in the afterlife. 103,000 grimoires—just storing them in a library and letting people read them one by one could kill 80% of the world. The remaining 20% might survive, but only a few could master the knowledge. Those who could fully comprehend all 103,000 and become a supreme magician? You could count them on one hand."
"And you say… this only takes up 85% of Index's brain?"
"Well…"
"Listen to me…"
Samuel cut Kanzaki off, continuing, "Let me tell you, the reason this knowledge is so terrifying is its 'mystery'—wisdom mortals can't comprehend. People drive themselves to death trying to understand it, trapping themselves in a corner, twisting their souls until they perish."
"But if you're not warped by those ideas, not pushed to the edge, it's just knowledge. You could store as much as you want!"
"Of course, that's impossible. Knowledge carries wisdom and ideas. Study too much physics or math, and your mind turns rational. Too much philosophy or ethics, and it becomes sentimental. Magic or mysticism? Your thinking gets 'mystical.' It's natural—'people are limited by what's in front of them.' That doesn't just mean your eyes; it's the information you take in. But to say knowledge can overload a brain? Trying to convince me with data? That's a joke!"
"But… it's…"
Kanzaki's face paled. As Index's friend, she'd played the villain, erasing her memories time and again, clinging to the excuse that "there's no other way." Samuel had torn that flimsy cover apart.
"Onee-san, ever been to school?"
"…"
"No? Huh, a dropout from basic education. You've been duped by the Anglican Church… Tch, they're not good for much, but they're pros at fooling people. Religion's something else, not even sparing their own Saints."
Religion might've once advanced humanity, but now it dragged progress backward. Samuel didn't deny magic's value, but these religions? Utterly pointless.
Manipulating minds was something Samuel hadn't done, even after gaining Mental Out. He just didn't like it.
Yet these religions thrived on it…
These sects were worse than the mages of the Type-Moon world!
"I…"
Kanzaki's voice trembled, her pupils shaking. Her mind replayed the times they'd erased Index's memories, chasing her down again and again…
"No… you're wrong. Every year… Index shows severe reactions. How do you explain—"
Clinging to a lifeline, Kanzaki shouted back.
Samuel looked at her with a mocking smirk, her desperate posture like a drowning person grasping a stick.
The reason was simple: sunk cost.
She'd paid too much for that "lie"—pouring unimaginable emotion into hurting her friend repeatedly. The cost was so great she couldn't bear to consider it might be false.
Even with Samuel exposing it, she held on, unwilling to believe, even if it meant deceiving herself.
Samuel stepped closer, lowering Kanzaki's restraints. He touched her cheek, inhaling her faint scent.
His gaze locked onto her eyes.
Her pupils trembled, instinctively wanting to retreat under his piercing stare.
"Miss Kanzaki Kaori, you're a magician! Don't you get it? A magician!"
Of course she understood.
Kanzaki was a magician. Her style differed from most, but she was undeniably one.
Causing discomfort—or even cursing someone to death from afar—was child's play for a magician.
But…
"With 103,000 grimoires in her mind, their knowledge would corrupt her brain. It's impossible to tamper with her mind using magic—or even her body!"
That's why she clung to this as her last lifeline!
"Really impossible? Or are you just not skilled enough?"
"What did you say?"
"Saints are born with the Power of God, a high-level mystical spell equivalent to thousands of ordinary grimoires. You can't fully wield it, but its presence grants you 'magic resistance' on par with Index's state. Watch…"
Samuel's index finger glowed, mystical light gathering at its tip.
"Hm~"
He pressed it to the inside of Kanzaki's exposed left thigh, tracing a pattern: horizontal, vertical, horizontal, vertical, horizontal—a "correct" mark.
A cool sensation tingled her skin, stirring something peculiar in Kanzaki.
"This is my latest technique. I call it the Master-Servant Contract!"
"Master-Servant Contract? You want to enslave me? Impossible… that kind of spell could never work on me."
Other magic might worry her, but a "forced enslavement" spell? No chance.
As a Saint, akin to the Son of God—a future deity in Crossist doctrine—she was conceptually close to the Lord, supreme and untouchable.
A god could never be enslaved!
***
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