It was a very foggy
night.
There were very few gas lamps in the East End[1] slums, and people could barely see their feet with the fog this thick. Street vendors closed early on nights like this, leaving only the foul smell of sewage, rotting corpses of cats and dogs, and the occasional appearance of prostitutes in the background.
“Short Legged Dick”
was a drunkard hated by many. He had short legs but nimble hands, and would
often brandish knives while drunk. Again that day he had drank a few cups of
cheap gin, and left the bar swearing after being ignored by everyone. The way
he staggered on his way home resembled some kind of seedy poultry.
At a street corner, a
prostitute called out to Dick. She was a fat woman, as fat as an elephant. Dick
remarked on her appearance and moved to pass her by; she then spat out these
words:
“You shitty
duckling.”
Her words triggered
Dick.
“The fuck did you
just say, you bitch……!”
Dick pulled out his
knife without hesitation, but then——
Clank…….
There was a metallic
noise ringing out from around the corner.
Dick and the elephant
woman looked at each other in bewilderment.
Clank…….
Clank…….
The sound,
reminiscent of a ghost knight, was gradually drawing closer to them.
“Hey, what the hell
is that noise……?”
“……A monster, it’s a
monster!"
The elephant woman
said with a fearful voice.
“All my friends have
already seen it. Apparently, it’s an African gorilla that escaped from the zoo
and settled in the River Thames.”
“You stupid bitch.
How can a gorilla live in——”
Suddenly, their
surroundings grew brighter as two large, shining eyes emerged from the night
fog.
The glowing-eyed
monster was a large, stocky humanoid being holding a long pole in its hand. It
was making a strange noise like a buzzing insect from its body, along with
clattering footsteps.
Clank.
Followed by a
clunking noise, it then pierced the stone street with the butt of its pole and
said in an strange, husky voice
[I am the “Knight of Science”~.]
“Gyaaah!”
The elephant woman screamed.
“It’s here! The gorilla! It’s the ‘Diving Gorilla’!!”
The monster corrected the claim.
[I am not a gorilla; I am the “Knight of Science”~.]
*Clack*——it lifted the rod like a charging spear and
pointed the tip at Dick.
[You villain, lay down your weapon at once~~. Or
else~~……]
Crackle——sparks flew between the two metallic wires
extended from the end of the staff.
“A-Asshole, you wanna pick a fight!?”
Dick raised his knife forward as he backed off.
*Clank*,
The monster moved one step forward.
“Eek——”
The woman turned her massive body around and began to
dash like a mad elephant.
“Ah?! W-Wait!”
Dick, still holding the knife, ran after her.
“Hold up, you dumbass——don’t fucking leave me!!”
[Drop your weapon~~.]
The monster who claimed to be the “Knight of Science”
began to chase down Dick with a clatter.
The elephant woman, “Short Legged Dick”, and the
monster were all surprisingly fast. Among them, the fastest was the elephant
woman, who was out of sight after turning a corner.
Whether fortunate or unfortunate, the remaining two,
Dick and the monster, nearly had the same speed.
Clank, clank, clank——neither of them could catch up to
nor shake off the other; they kept running through several streets while
maintaining the same distance.
But finally——crash!
The monster tripped over a small step in the
cobblestone and dramatically spun and fell onto its back.
The light on its eyes suddenly disappeared.
“Hyaah——!”
“Short Legged Dick” never looked back but disappeared
into the mist like a headless duck.
+
The monster wriggled its limbs like a turtle. It was
unable to stand on its own due to the massive backpack on its shoulders.
[Nyala!]
As the monster shouted, a woman dressed as a maid
quickly approached it. She was a dark-skinned woman wearing glasses, appearing
to be around 30 years old. She held a bucket and a toolbox in both hands.
[Please, Nyala, help me up!]
“Yes yes.”
The servant called Nyala used the monster’s “spear” as
leverage to flip its metal body.
The monster lifted itself up on both hands and sat
down on the cobblestone. Next, it pointed its finger on its head——the helmet
that resembled a diving suit’s.
[Ah, open it for me!]
“Yes yes.”
Nyala took out a small wrench from the toolbox and
quickly loosened the bolts around its neck. When the thick helmet came off,
steam surged up from inside.
“Phew!”
From the steam, a girl that looks to be around 17 or
18 years old appeared. Her face was deep red as she breathed like bellows.
“I-I think there is some r-room for improvement on the
heat exhaust and ventilation system.”
“Yes, it seems so——and by the way, I suggest you put
some padding around your head.”
The girl’s temple was bruised, likely from banging her
head on the inside of her helmet when she fell.
Nyala squeezed the towel from the bucket filled with
cold water and roughly wiped the girl’s face.
“Ouch, please do it more gently!”
"Yes yes——milady, do you want an ice cream?”
“I want one.”
Nyala took out an airtight container from the ice
water, opened the cap, and handed over a spoon to her. The girl received it
with her bulky gloves and smiled happily as she began to eat it.
Meanwhile, Nyala sat behind her, applying first aid to
the broken lighting fixture.
“Oh my, this is delicious! This flavor——you put lemon
juice in it, right?!”
“You are correct.”
“Hmm! Nyala, you are such a genius when it comes to
making ice cream——ah, ow ow ow!”
The girl, who had been feeding herself with the spoon
non-stop, pressed her hand against her temple. It wasn’t a bruise, but a headache
caused by eating ice cream.
“Please take your time to eat.”
Whether she listened to Nyala’s advice or not, she
emptied the ice cream container and let out a contented sigh.
“I want you to put strawberry jam in it tomorrow.”
Nyala responded as she arranged her tools.
“Yes, I got it——well then, shall we stop here and go
back?”
“No way! The night is still dark and long!”
With a clack, the girl stood up, and the rumbling
sound of an electric motor reverberated from her whole body.
“Nyala, the essence of science is nothing but
[constant advancement].”
"Yes yes, you truly are the icon of scientific
spirit.”
“Exactly!”
The girl lightly pierced her electrode-attached
rod——the electric spear—into the cobblestone, and turned on the arc lights[2] resembling a monster’s eyes that were fixed on top of her battery
backpack
.
“And with my spirit, it is my mission as Augusta Ada
Derleth[3],
known as the ‘Knight of Science’, to protect the peace of the public and to
illuminate the dark of night!”
“But everyone calls you the ‘Diving Gorilla’ though.”
“That’s the problem.”
Ada pursed her lips.
“Seriously, I wonder how they could come up with the
Gorilla thing, and what’s with the ‘diving’ stuff?”
“Probably because——”
Nyala said as she fixed the “Knight’s” helmet.
“This
electric
gear
looks like ‘a gorilla in a diving suit’, doesn’t it?”
+
“‘Diving Gorilla’! ‘Diving Gorilla’! The River Thames
Monster, the ‘Diving Gorilla’, has shown up again!”
A newspaper boy shouted out loud as he ran down the
street.
——An eyewitness, Mrs. Elena Phiten, provided the
following information to the newspaper reporter:
“Yes, yes, I saw it. I really saw it. It was about
three meters, no, five meters tall. It came to attack me; its twinkling eye was
as large as a plate, it let out a growl like a beast from hell, and then——alas,
how frightening! It grabbed the man in front of me and vigorously ate him
alive, starting from his head!”
In response to this incident, the London Zoo
commented: “There is no evidence that any gorillas, orangutans, or any other
great apes have escaped their enclosures.”——
“……This is such a huge misunderstanding.”
With a thud, Ada slammed down the several newspapers
she was carrying and sat down at a table in a cafe facing Fleet Street[4],
her hands visibly trembling as she held the one paper she was currently
reading. Incidentally, she was wearing the casual attire a young lady would
normally wear: a hat, glasses, and a small bag. Who could ever guess that this
lovely lady was the true identity of the “Diving Gorilla”?
From behind, someone took a peek at her newspaper.
“——Hey Miss, are you interested in monsters?”
Ada replied as she turned back.
“Nope, not in the slightest!”
“Hoh——?”
The strange-looking man widened his eyes at Ada’s
spirit.
He was a tanned Asian man who spoke with an American
dialect. His casual shirt and leather hat were out of place on the streets of
London——but if he added a gun belt and a spur, he would perfectly match the
image of a cowboy.
“——Then, why are you reading that article so much?”
As the man said so, this time, he playfully narrowed
his round eyes and lifted his hat to greet her. He was probably over forty
years old, but looked ten years younger when he smiled.
“What I am reading about is not ‘monsters’, but an
‘incident’.”
Ada replied in a provoking, self-satisfied tone.
“From the start, there is no such thing as ‘monsters’
in this world. A lack of inquisitiveness and rationality leads to the
hallucination of demons in the darkness of an alleyway.”
“I see.”
The man nodded.
“Just as there is no plant called a ‘weed’, there is
no entity called a ‘monster’. What you are drawn to is not the weirdness
itself, but the truth behind the darkness of superstition——is that what you’re
saying?”
“You got it right!”
Ada put up her index finger with a pleased look.
“So, um, you are……?”
The man sat on the other side of her.
“My friends call me ‘Hardy Cody’.”
“May I call you by that name?’
“If I may have the honor of treating this charming
young lady to a cup of tea.”
“Oh my, that sounds like a lovely proposal, but I have
one issue.”
Ada spoke to Cody as he was calling a clerk.
“——I prefer ice cream more.”
As Ada was waiting for her order, she unfolded five
newspapers at once on the table and began to skim through them. Little by
little, she read them thoroughly, from the front page articles to columns about
economics and society, plus even the dubious gossip write-ups.
“You’re very studious——are you perhaps a student?”
Ada answered Cody’s question without lifting her head.
“I’m a reporter.”
“Reporter?”
“Yes, a newspaper reporter. I am Derleth from the
[Weekly New Century] Journal. As someone who is responsible for world
enlightenment, it’s a matter of course for me to not neglect my own studies——ah,
there it is, thanks for the meal!”
Ada tossed away the newspaper and started eating her
ice cream, as if shoving her face into the glass that had been served to
her——then, suddenly, she noticed Cody’s gaze.
“……What is it?”
“No, I just think that you really enjoy ice cream.”
“Of course.”
As Ada relentlessly fed her spoon to her mouth,
“Ice cream cools down the blood that circulates to our
brains as well as providing sugar needed for thinking. It can be described as
the true fruit of artificial human wisdom and an outstanding ‘civilized
food’——Ah, ow, ow, ow, ouch!”
“I see. So that means civilization is also accompanied
by pain.”
Ada closed her eyes and placed her left hand at her
temple, swinging her spoon as if implying, (That’s right!).
At that moment, the clock tower’s bell rang at noon.
“Ah, not good!”
Ada nimbly jumped to her feet like a spring device.
“What’s the matter?”
“It’s the interview! From one o’clock, there will be a
lecture by Mr. Hadou at the British Association for the Advancement of
Science——do you know the king of America’s railroad, ‘Hadou Kouzou’?”
“Ah, let’s see…… I’m pretty sure he struck it rich
after hitting a gold mine in Arizona, I think.”
“Thirty points!”
Ada said flatly.
“Such a description barely represents a single aspect
of the man in question. He does business in iron ore, coal, oil, and many other
things! That’s not even counting his brilliance with stockjobbing in the New
York Market——!”
“Thanks for the explanation, but aren’t you in a
hurry?”
“Ah yes.”
Ada took out a watch from her coat’s pocket.
“That’s weird; I’m sure I’ve set the bell——”
Ada pursed her lips as she glared at the clock plate,
shook it two or three times next to her face, then brought it close to her ear
as if to check its sound, then,
Dingding——!!
“Gyaah!?”
She accidentally threw away the watch due to the
sudden burst of sound.
“Hoh——did you put a bell into that watch?”
Cody picked up the loud ringing watch from the table;
after observing it back and forth, he stopped the sound by rotating its
knob.
Ada grasped her hat tightly to her chest, and took a
deep breath before speaking.
“T-The volume is sufficient, but it’s apparent that
there is room for improvement in its reliability.”
“But your idea is not so bad. If you can add a little
bit of improvement, it can be sold as a product.”
“Oh my, then I better register my patent right away.”
After receiving the pocket watch from Cody, Ada slung
her bag over her shoulder and gave a curtsey by pinching the hem of her skirt.
“Thank you for the delicious treat, Mr. Cody!”
She then mounted a Rover bike parked next to the cafe,
pulled a small lever attached to the handlebars, and started up the electric
motor installed on the back wheel. It made a sound like a swarm of insects
before accelerating at a
trotting
speed.
“Well then, have a good day————!”
With one hand on her electric bike and the other
holding her hat, Ada swept through the streets filled with carriages and
pedestrians in a flash.
“……Hoh.”
As Cody watched her figure disappear out of his sight
cheerfully,
“Sir, were you waiting here?”
——A voice called out to him from behind him.
Cody answered without so much as turning his head.
“Sorry, Crawford[5].
I just wanted to take a short walk, but there was something that inadvertently
sparked my interest.”
The one called Crawford was a large man dressed as a
butler. He was within the age range to be considered an old man. The remaining
hair on the sides of his balding head was white, and the beard on his chin was
also as white as snow. There were also several scars decorating his face;
perhaps they were caused by some sort of personal history. Among them was a
strikingly large one that ran through his left eye and reached his cheek.
Perhaps because of that, the sharpness of his remaining eye was unmatched by an
ordinary person.
The sharp glint in his eye suddenly softened.
“What an energetic young lady.”
“She’s exactly my type.”
Crawford responded to Cody’s casual joke with only his
right eyebrow.
“It’s almost time, sir. Should I turn the car around?”
“No, let’s take it easy.”
Cody crossed his legs and unfolded the newspaper Ada
had left.
“[Hadou Kouzou
is late]. [He fully
realized the necessity of a scientific device to manage his own time——for
example, a new watch model that can be seen as a portable secretary with a
feature to tell the time——]. ……Don’t you think this will be a nice promotion
for the new product?”
+
After arriving at the venue thirty minutes late, the
president of Hadou Enterprise, Hadou Kouzou, apologized for his
inconsiderateness on stage before immediately advertising his new watch instead
of delivering a speech. Some of the attendees frowned at his brazen attitude,
while the majority of them gave a wry smile, yet they all eagerly awaited his
next words. In any case, nobody could take their eyes off the man.
The theme of his lecture was [Regarding the
Possibilities of the “Analytical Engine[6]”].
The purpose of Hadou Kouzou’s trip to England on this
occasion was to buy the blueprint of a mechanical calculator left by
mathematician Charles Babbage[7] and the associated rights from his bereaved family.
Babbage’s calculator, the “Analytical Engine”, was
never finished despite receiving over ten thousand pounds in funding from the
British government due to technical overestimates, resulting in the project
being abandoned. Hadou offered fifty thousand pounds for the blueprints of this
machine that was deserted half a century ago. What was this mysterious
speculator trying to accomplish by spending such a huge amount of money on an
armchair theory?——However, as Hadou gathered the curious gazes from the
audience, what he presented was nothing but mundane ideas like “Information
Management via Punch Cards[8]”
or “Mechanical Statistical Analysis”.
“——In short, once this advanced machine is finished,
it will represent work equivalent to a hundred of the most capable office
workers.”
When Hadou finished his statement, one of the audience
members raised his opinion.
“But wouldn’t it be cheaper to just hire one hundred
workers, mister?”
“Ooh——you’re right!”
Hadou clapped his hands,
“That is the weak point. Would you sell that idea for
fifty pounds?”
Everyone laughed in a sarcastic manner, but agreed.
Hadou was not only known for his skill in stock trading, but also as a “Comical
Dilettante”. He would zip around in novel vehicles such as cars and airships,
venture into the uncharted territories of places like India and Africa using a
hatchet, yet would provide huge financial support to various engineers and
artists as a sponsor——today’s subject was likely another one of his hobbies.
Upon reflection, a product like the so-called “Mechanical Calculator” is
exactly the kind of toy Hadou would enjoy.
Afterwards, his lecture concluded with a
question-and-answer session about the technical and economic prospects of
mechanical calculators.
As the hollering crowd exited the venue, a portly
gentleman——the chairman of the British Association for the Advancement of
Science—shook Hadou’s hands.
“That was such an interesting topic, Mr. Hadou.”
“Oh no, it’s embarrassing. I’m more of a specialist in
financial accounting——”
Then,
“——You’re very good at feigning ignorance,
Mr.
Cody.”
“Oh——?”
As Hadou kept the chairman company while loosening his
necktie, he noticed the only remaining person in the audience.
The girl——Augusta Ada Derleth—was wearing a reporter’s
armband, with her chest puffed out and legs wide open in a daunting pose; Hado
spoke to her with a smile.
“What do you mean by feigning ignorance?”
“Well, I’m not so sure——but I don’t think the
Analytical Engine’s purpose is limited to what you just said.
Using a
calculator simply for mere calculations
doesn’t fit the mindset of
Hadou Kouzou at all. Yes, I won’t be tricked by you again!”
Saying that, Ada prepared her writing materials as she
stared straight at Hadou. Behind her glasses, her large eyes sparkled vividly,
just like a kitten stalking its prey.
“The real interview starts now. Care to tell me some
interesting stories as a fee in exchange for the new watch design’s idea?”
“Miss, your enthusiasm for studying is amazing, but
the time for questions has ended.”
The chairman politely rejected her. But——
“Hmm.”
Hadou grinned.
“——Crawford, what’s next on our schedule?”
The large one-eyed giant of a man standing near the
wall took a step forward. The man was Hadou’s butler, Crawford.
“It’s the tea party with the chairman, sir.”
“Alright.”
Hadou pushed his pre-made suit and tie onto Crawford,
receiving a dirty hat in return. Then, as he picked up and shook the chairman’s
hand, he said,
“My apologies, but I just recalled an urgent matter.
Regarding my donation to your association, please send word to my butler; I
will do my best to meet your expectations. Well then, farewell!”
Smiling brightly, he raised his hat. There was a
mysterious charm in his impolite demeanor.
Hadou gave Ada a wink as he headed for the exit.
“Eh——ah, p-please excuse me!”
Ada bowed to the chairman and followed after him.
The chairman, dumbfounded, looked back and forth
between the exit where Hadou had left and Crawford’s face.
Crawford moved his right eyebrow slightly and slowly
nodded.
“Let’s chat about your inquiries.”
+
Hadou Kouzou brought Ada to the British Museum,
London’s largest tourist attraction and the world’s largest museum.
As they passed by the Ionic columns at the entrance,
Hadou said.
“So——Young lady, do you know why I chose this place?”
“Umm, by any chance……”
Ada hesitated for a moment, then looked up at Hadou
with curious eyes.
“……Was it the Rosetta Stone[9]……?”
As Hadou nodded, Ada energetically clapped her hands
together in front of her chest.
“——‘Machine Translation of Hieroglyphs’! Estimating
linguistic activity as some kind of algebra and processing them through
arithmetical procedures——such a brilliant scientific idea!”
What Ada was referring to was the public experiment
that Hadou conducted in Arkham City last year.
By using a perfect imitation of the Rosetta Stone, a
team under Hadou Kouzou’s command had retranslated that epitaph, which was once
successfully deciphered by Champollion[10] from France, in just a few hours.
The accuracy of the translation was confirmed by an
Egyptologist who was invited to examine it; however, the important point of
this experiment was that nobody, including Hadou and his subordinates,
had
any prior knowledge
of the contents of the text engraved on the Rosetta
Stone. All they did was simply sort the
sacred symbols
that
they had copied onto cards, and rearrange them
according to a systematic procedure.
“As long as we have proper dictionaries and manuals,
it’s possible to translate even without any special knowledge or talent.”
——That was Hadou’s conclusion.
Next, Ada spoke the words Hadou presumably mentioned
before.
“[Ultimately, a “translator” does not have to be a
human being. For example, they could be a trained animal or even a geared
machine——].”
After saying that, Ada snapped her fingers.
“——An Analytical Engine! You’re going to use that
Analytical Engine for translation work, right!?”
Hadou leaned his head and grinned instead of replying.
Ada continued speaking further.
“Still, that should not be the end of it. The reason
why Hadou Kouzou purposely chose expensive machines in place of a hundred
office staff…… It was——hmm——‘speed’, I think? Grasping the latest news from
countries all over the world connected by telecommunication networks,
instructing the locals, and occasionally forming contracts in foreign
languages——Yes! If all of these works can be sped up mechanically, it would
come with a huge business advantage. I’d say it’s called the ‘communications
revolution’ following the Industrial Revolution, perhaps?”
“That’s a good point of view. Indeed, that is one of
its aspects.”
Hadou answered.
“Since the industry in our modern world has been
mechanized and accelerated via steam engines, it is the fault of us
dimwitted
‘humans’ for hindering business. Things we can delegate to machines should be
done so on a continuous basis. Besides……
machines never die.”
“Huh?”
Ada looked up to Hadou with a puzzled look.
“Did someone die during the translation?”
“Ah…… no, no.”
Hadou scratched his head.
“In other words, as the scale of business is getting
bigger, information trade will also become frequent. It would be troublesome
for us if the interpreters died due to being overworked.”
Hadou looked away from Ada and began to walk faster.
“——Now then, allow me to explain the translation
process in front of the real Rosetta Stone.”
“Ye…… Yes.”
Ada followed behind Hadou, feeling as though he had
dodged her question.
Then——as they were heading towards the destined route
in the museum, Hadou’s footsteps suddenly came to a halt.
“What’s wrong?”
Ada followed Hadou’s gaze with her eyes.
In the corner of the exhibition hall,
it
was hidden between the giant stone pillars and reliefs.
It was a small stone pillar roughly the size of a
human thigh——no, it was a
stone statue. The thing looked like an
unrefined sculpture that represented a bird——or maybe a bat-like creature
standing upright with its wings folded, yet at the same time, there was
something inanimate and misshapen about it.
The plaque read “The Manaus Divine Statue”, with a
brief explanation detailing that the statue had been discovered six months
prior in Manaus, South America’s largest city in the Amazon River basin.
The stone’s material, apparently basalt, was thickly
colored with a bright red paint on a dark base, which resembled a heretical god
covered in the blood of a sacrifice. Its form was so terrifyingly sinister that
it gave a feeling of being peered at by an ancient evil god through the eye
sockets carved into the stone.
Ada gasped in reflexive fear——but then she took another
deeper breath and forced it out through her nose.
“It’s truly a simple design. To think that we could
discover the shadow of ‘death’ and ‘fear’ even in such a plain
three-dimensional object, the human’s heart is——”
As Ada said so, she looked up at Hadou’s face to seek
his approval. However——
Hadou Kouzou was staring at the stone statue. His
facial expression was grim, and the air of serenity that always surrounded him
had completely disappeared.
“……
Liber Legis[11]……!”
As soon as he murmured those words that sounded like a
curse,
——Shiver——
The atmosphere in the hall shifted. It turned dark,
cold, and sinister…… No, it might have been only Ada who felt that way. The
spectators around them appeared to be oblivious as they continued on their way,
exchanging idle banter. It was as if only the statue, Hadou Kouzou, and Ada
were isolated in a different dimension.
No——there was another person
there. With
his dark gaze, he peered at them from a location approximately ten meters away.
Carrying a stick in his hand, he wore a dark coat and had a black top hat. At first glance, he dressed like a British gentleman…… but his skin was deep dark brown, indicating he was an Arabian or an Indian.
The man in the coat lowered his hat and
vanished into the shadow of the guests and exhibits.
And——
They felt as though a spell had been
broken, and the noise around them returned.
“Ah——”
Ada looked up at Hadou.
“Umm…… Was he your acquaintance?”
“Who knows……?”
Hadou answered as he followed where the
man had gone.
His bearded face formed another grin.
He no longer wore the expression of a
teacher attending to his favorite student that he did earlier. His smile was
that of a beast, one of a warrior, exuding a fierce aura.
Hadou suddenly turned to Ada.
“Sorry, but I have an urgent matter to attend
to, young lady. Our date ends here.”
“Huh, but…… the interview…”
“It was a fun interview. Now, if you’ll
excuse me!”
Hadou took off his hat to salute her,
walked away without looking back, and flagged down a nearby security guard.
“You, call the manager of this floor——”
+
After a few minutes, Ada found the
floor manager and got information about Hadou from him.
“Good grief, Americans think that
anything can be bought with money, don’t they?”
The manager said in a sarcastic tone.
“Haah, you mean buying…… that stone
statue?”
As Ada asked, the manager nodded.
“Buying even just a small stone from
the exhibition of this museum is like buying the dignity of the Great British
Empire. That would be impossible, even if that man was the richest man in the world.”
——What kind of expression would this
man have if he found out that the man he just personally turned away was
literally “the richest man in the world”?
As she tried not to show any sign of
such thoughts,
“Yes, you are right. It’s a regrettable
matter indeed.”
Ada said in agreement, and the manager
nodded with a satisfied look as he continued speaking.
“Still, I wonder if that kind of thing
is trending these days…… There was another person who wanted to buy that same
statue.”
“Eh——?”
The appearance of the dark-eyed man
from earlier came to Ada’s mind.
“By any chance…… could that be an
Arabian with a hat?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
The manager answered.
“That suspicious man brought several
huge, pitch-black servants along with him. ……Wait, was he even wearing a hat?”
+
“And so, the museum staff member
said……”
After Ada finished typing, she breathed
deeply, crossing her arms before her desk.
“I can smell something fishy going on
here……!”
“——Milady.”
Hearing Nyala’s voice behind her, Ada
turned around.
“In this room, please call me
Editor-in-Chief.”
The editorial department of the [Weekly
New Century]’s paper was located in one room of the Derleth’s mansion. The
members were only the Editor-in-Chief, Ada, and her special advisor, Nyala.
Nyala reviewed the articles written by Ada and printed approximately one
hundred copies from the mansion’s printing room, which she then distributed to
local pubs and clubs at no cost. In fact, Ada’s so-called “journalism” was
recognized as “the hobbies of the daughter of the Derleth household” by the
townspeople.
“Yes yes. Then,
Editor-in-Chief…”
Nyala said as she opened the rolled-up
blueprint that she had been holding next to the typewriter. It was a
semi-automatic switchgear for helmets by using a spring device.
“This is a proposal for the improvement
of your motor suit that I got this morning.”
“Is there any problem with it?”
“If you mount the hinge at this
position, it will hit the backpack right away.”
“Oh my, you are right.”
Ada pulled the blueprint in front of
her and began writing on it with a pencil.
“Um, then, I should attach a sliding
device to this part right here——”
“……About that, milady, no, I mean,
Editor-in-Chief…”
Nyala spoke to her as she flipped
through the manuscript Ada had typed up a moment ago.
“You got the spelling wrong again.”
“Eh, where?”
Ada was so absorbed in the blueprint
that she answered without lifting her head.
“C, H, A, M, P, O, L, L, I, O, N. The
correct writing of Champollion has two ‘L’s in it.”
“Cha, m, pol, li…… Hmm, I got it. Mind
if you fix it for me?”
“Please don’t be so lazy. The more you
fix by yourself, the better you remember, Mrs. Editor-in-Chief.”
“……Urgh~~.”
When Ada turned around and took the
manuscript like a student receiving her homework,
Dingding……!!
Her pocket watch’s bell rang.
“Oh my, it’s time already! Let’s do the
rest tomorrow.”
After saying that, Ada got up, and the
two quickly jogged down the long, dark corridor heading towards the warehouse
on the first floor.
Ada and Nyala were the only two
residents in this vast mansion. Although the fortune that her late father, Lord
Derleth, had left to her was far from small, Ada’s lifestyle was quite
modest.
Ada was never interested in typical
luxuries.
From the beginning, her exceedingly
public and busy double life as a newspaper reporter by day, and the “Knight of
Science” protecting the London streets by night almost never left room for her
personal time.
——Although she was the only one who
thought that way, in fact, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to consider all of
her behaviors as indulgences.
“Hurry up, Nyala!”
“Haah, you don’t have to be in such a
rush; it’s not like someone is waiting for us——”
Ada said as she ran down the stairs two
steps at a time.
“London is waiting for me!”
Then——
“
This
or
that,
don’t you think it’s better to just focus on either one of them? So that every
night isn’t so hectic.”
Nyala grumbled as she placed the motor
suit onto a cart and brought it out from the warehouse, which also acted as a
maintenance room.
“Nyala, that’s called lack of awareness.”
Replied Ada as she replaced the clothes
she had discarded with a corset made specifically for her motor suit.
“Educational activities through journalism
and night watch work by the motor suit are inseparable duties; they can be like
two wheels of a car. We must understand the extremely complicated
mechanical
structure that is our modern society and constantly persevere to improve
it!”
When Nyala put her hips into turning
the handle installed on the pillar, the motor suit, suspended from the ceiling
by ropes and pulleys, rose like a marionette. Once Ada was fit inside the
cladding that resembled an empty lobster shell, Nyala started to fix her body
to the frame of her motor suit with leather straps.
“*Sigh*…… Is that also an example of
your ‘constant advancement’?”
“That’s right!”
Ada switched on the main power lever
and the motor suit, which was in a half-sitting posture due to its own weight,
puffed up its chest as the roars of its electric motors rose from its body. As
if the electricity called the “Flame of Science” breathed life into its
groaning and grotesque body.
The motor suit’s arm made a
high-pitched noise as it pointed up and diagonally
“Until the day all trouble in the world
ceases, the battle of the ‘Knight of Science’ will never end!”
“Haha, indeed.”
Nyala said as she tightened the
helmet’s bolt.
“It seems that you’re mainly trying to
increase the number of stories by other newspapers nowadays.”
+
That night, the fog was as thick as it
usually was.
On Great Russell Street[12], faintly illuminated by
the gas lights, there was a strange figure.
A tall Asian man was walking at a quick
pace, holding a package the size of a child under his arm——he was Hadou Kouzou.
Exploiting a gap in the night guards’
patrol, he managed to take the “Manaus Divine Statue” while causing some damage
to the museum building.
Money could not purchase “The Prestige
of the Great British Empire”.
If he could not buy it with money, then
just steal it——
Of course, they would track him down
soon. However, as long as he got
the item
first, the advantage
would be his. The rest was negotiating a suitable compensation to pay the other
party, whether it be the police, the museum, or even the British government
itself——that was Hadou Kouzou’s method.
With a low roar, a bizarre box-shaped
vehicle rushed towards Hadou. It was a
horseless carriage
equipped with an internal combustion engine——in other words, an “automobile”.
The car made a small noise as it
stopped next to Hadou.
“Well done. Everything is going exactly
according to our plan.”
The one-eyed butler, Crawford, answered
as he held onto the wheel in the driver’s seat.
Hadou tossed the package onto the car’s
seat and boarded himself in. Then, at that moment when Crawford was going to
start the car——
“Hadou Kouzou.”
A low voice called out to him from
within the fog.
Next, the sound of a cane echoed, and a
figure emerged. It was a man with brown skin, dressed in a coat and a top hat.
The man stood in front of their car.
“Leave that statue and be gone——that is
not yours to touch.”
“Howdy.”
Hadou leaned out of the car window and
lifted his hat.
“You’re also right on schedule. I
wanted to see you, ‘Master of Necronomicon’.”
The man in the coat——the “Master of
the Book of the Dead
”, Azrad—had a tense demeanor. Wielding
his stick like a club, he raised his index finger and little finger to cast a
sign—the “Voorish Sign”—with his hand.
Then——a luminous pattern surfaced on
his cane. The light suddenly turned his entire cane into a red-hot iron rod,
and the next moment, it was forged into a huge magic blade——the “Scimitar of
Barzai”.
Azard readied the Scimitar. His
expression already returned to an icy calm, but his inner fighting spirit
flared up as magical symbols emerged on the Scimitar’s surface.
“……How did you know that name?”
“Well…”
Hadou grinned as he took out a
long-barreled revolver from his pocket.
The air between the two men who pointed
their weapons at each other rapidly became tense.
Then——
[Yaayaayaargh!]
A booming sound like a broken bell
echoed.
[I am the “Knight of Science”~~!]
On the roof of a nearby three story
building, a stocky figure carrying two arc lamps resembling monster eyes
arrived. It was the self-proclaimed “Knight of Science”, Augusta Ada Derleth,
wearing her motor suit.
Ada lightly tapped the tip of the
electric spear and shouted at the men on the street.
[Stealing is bad, so stop it now~~. And
cease all of your violent acts right away~~. If you do not comply~~——]
Crawford spoke to Hadou, who was
looking up at the sky instinctively with his mouth wide open.
“——Sir?”
“Hmm…… No, this is a bit unexpected.”
[Hmph~~.]
Ada suddenly jumped into the air. Her
heavy, clumsy body looked as if it would fall, but shook violently and was suspended
mid-air. A thin rope stretched from her body to a balloon about two meters in
diameter in the sky. Ada's descent was decelerated by the buoyancy of the
balloon——
Crash!
[Kyaah!?]
“Uoh!?”
One of her legs smashed through Hadou’s
car roof. The balloon
landed
as the hook on its back became loose
and it drifted away into the night sky.
From above the roof of the building, a
woman in a maid uniform leaned forward.
“Milady~~?”
[O-O-O-Ouch, t-there is some room for
improvement in buoyancy control——]
“Hey young lady, pardon me, but please
stop moving your legs——ow, ow, ow, ow.”
Amidst such an uproar, only Azrad
remained silent. His eyes, which were focused ahead, and his arm gripping the
magic blade were not wavering even the slightest. Then——
Suddenly, Azrad threw the Scimitar.
“Hmm——!”
Hadou fired his gun while the side of
his head was being kicked by the motor suit’s boots.
The bullet grazed Azrad’s shoulder as
the Scimitar’s blade brushed Hadou’s head——
““Geck——!””
They heard a beastly cry bellow from behind
them, followed by the thud of something heavy falling.
The things that had fallen were two
leopards——correct,
wild black leopards were hiding in the middle of London streets.
One leopard was shot through its
forehead, while the other had its head chopped off. The weapons of Hadou and
Azrad had taken out the beasts that stalked them from behind.
After catching the Scimitar that came
back to him like a boomerang with an air-cutting sound, Azrad looked down at
the beast’s corpse.
Next——the black leopard’s bloodstained
fur began to shudder as it instantly transformed into a naked, black-skinned
giant of a man, then into a mass of wriggling tentacles, and finally into a
dark, tar-like lump of mucus that seeped into the gaps of the cobblestone.
“As I thought——”
Hadou continued Azrad’s whisper.
“Indeed, the
beastmen
of
D∴D∴
——they are our enemies.”
At that moment, several shadowy figures
seeped out onto the street from the narrow alleyway.
They were dark-skinned men with
distinctive reptilian faces——each of them wore coats and hats, yet the outfits
did not suit their bodies well, as if a bunch of apes were forced to put them
on. Some had their hats sideways, and others wore only one shoe.
“““Kurh, Oooowr!!”””
Raising their strange howls, the horde
of black wild men transformed all at once.
Their swelling bodies ripped the seams
of their clothes apart from the inside. The wild men quickly transfigured into
all sorts of wild animals——such as leopards, gorillas, bears——and even
two-legged carnivorous dinosaurs.
[Eh, eh, eh——what on earth are they!?]
The car was surrounded by a herd of
unimaginable beasts. The beasts lowered their heads, staring intensely at their
targets as they gradually closed their encirclement.
“——Let’s leave, Crawford!”
“Yes, sir.”
Crawford pulled the lever in his
driver’s seat, and with a roar of the internal combustion engine, the car began
to dash forward.
“Hop in!”
As soon as Hadou urged, Azrad leapt
high, jumping next to Ada——onto the car’s roof—and then hurled his Scimitar
forward. The soaring magic blade drew an arc, slicing through a gorilla and a
carnivorous dinosaur that were approaching from their front, forcing the
surrounding beasts to retreat a great distance.
The car managed to slip through a gap
in their formation, but the beasts let out roars and pursued them.
“Grroowaaaarh!!”
A saber-toothed tiger rushed them from
the side and leapt onto the car.
[Kyaah!]
Ada twisted her body, but her right leg
was stuck into the roof all the way up to her thigh, so she could not avoid it.
The saber-toothed tiger pressed down on her motor suit. Its massive,
dagger-like fangs fervently gnawed at her helmet; eventually, they reached into
her soft joint——
Dark red blood sprayed on the window of
her helmet. Azrad swung his Scimitar and cleaved the saber-toothed tiger’s body
in half.
The saber-toothed tiger turned into a
lump of mucus as it dropped to the ground, splashing onto the street.
[T-Thanks——]
As Ada raised her eyes to her savior,
Azrad gave her a glance with his dark eyes; he turned his gaze ahead once more
and muttered only a single word.
“——Al Azif.”
Flap——a sound akin to the fluttering of
paper sounded out as the figure of a girl manifested from within Azrad’s coat
pocket.
White skin, silver hair, jade green
eyes——a bewitching avatar with otherworldly beauty.
Ada, who was unaware of the Grimoire
[Al Azif]’s existence, had the common sense to try to deny this——yet her
intuition told her that this girl was not
a being subjected to this
reality——.
“Protect her.”
When Azrad ordered, the girl looked
away.
“This one is just a little girl; we
should ignore her.”
But Azrad did not answer; he only aimed
his focus ahead. Al Azif twisted her lips in annoyance, saying.
“……Understood, my master.”
[What the hell do you mean by “little
girl”? You clearly look smaller than me——kyaargh!]
A carnivorous dinosaur larger than the
car howled and snapped at Ada.
However, a tiny, white hand was pressed
onto its giant snout.
“Get lost, you lowlife worm.”
In the blink of an eye,
an
invisible power
surged through Al Azif’s slender arm, flowing into the
viscera of the carnivorous dinosaur through her palm, causing its massive body
to explode from the inside.
A rain of blood splattered across her
face as her jade green eyes looked down at Ada.
“Move your butt a little——don’t get in
my way, little girl.”
[Ah, you called me a “little girl”
again! ——Why yoooou!]
With the roar of the electric motors
rising from her entire body, Ada rose to her feet and finally managed to pull
her right leg out of the roof.
[Eat that!]
Ada struck a tiger running alongside
the car with the tip of her electric spear. Electrodes scattered sparks,
flinging the tiger backwards as it fell on the road like it was being repelled.
[Take that! And that!]
Ada’s electric spear, Hadou’s bullets,
Azrad’s Scimitar, and Al Azif’s magic-powered attacks scattered the herd of
wild beasts, securing a path forward. Accompanied by the horde, the car sped
straight through foggy London.
On top of the car, Azrad called out to
Hadou who was leaning out at his feet.
“Hadou Kouzou, leave that
package——that’s what they’re after.”
“Uh huh.”
Hadou Kouzou, who had been firing his
gun in succession, answered as he discarded a cartridge case.
“Do you think this Hadou Kouzou will
just abandon
the treasure
he gained so easily?”
“Even if that means losing your life in
return?”
“That is why I’m counting on your help.
Mutual aid is fundamental in business.”
“I’m not interested in trading.”
“Oh, don’t say that.”
As Hadou reloaded his gun,
“Fighting against inhuman magical
syndicates all by yourself would be tough, right? Hadou’s financial muscle,
information resources, and power——there is no reason to not utilize them!”
Then, he fired another barrage. An ape
man, who was leaping along a building’s wall, was shot through his forehead and
heart.
Taking advantage of that timing, a
leopard sprang on Hadou, but it was cut in half by the blade of the Scimitar.
“……This has nothing to do with me.”
Azrad’s eyes became gloomy, but Hadou grinned
broadly.
“Hmm, well, that’s fine…… But at any
rate,
you’ll
become involved with
me
anyway.”
The car continued running with
relentless mechanical power; eventually it managed to completely outpace the herd
of wild beasts.
However…
*Flutter*——Like a feather floating down
from the heavens, a humanoid figure appeared before Crawford’s eyes.
Before he could even brake reflexively
in time, the car crashed into the figure with lethal force——yet the seemingly
weightless figure stepped back gently to avoid the impact.
As the car came to a halt, the
shadow——a petite person wrapped in a robe—took a step forward. The hood was
pulled over their eyes, concealing their expression.
“Mr. Hadou. Please forgive my servants’
prior boorish behaviors.”
It was a husky voice belonging to that
of an old man.
“The statue you have——it was taken from
our cult. It may be worthless to outsiders, but for us it is worth more than
our lives. We hope that you’ll return it to us…… Of course, it won’t be for
free.”
The old man whistled softly, and two
black men appeared from the back of the alley, each carrying a leather bag. The
old man reached into one of the bags, took out a jewel, and handed it to Hadou.
“The good thing is you are a man of
reason. Please name your price.”
“I see——”
Hadou pointed the gun in his right hand
at the old man as he squinted; inspecting the object he received in his left.
It was a pure ruby the size of an egg.
“It’s true, I am a self-proclaimed
miser. I’m willing to make a deal with any human as long as they have cash.”
“Oh, then——”
“If they are human, that is.”
Hadou fired without hesitation. The
bullet was aimed at the old man’s glabella——
Yet, from point-blank range, the man
dodged the bullet by contorting his body in an uncanny fashion. Only his hood
was grazed by the bullet, revealing his true face.
No, that was not an old man, but rather a beautiful woman with brown skin beneath the hood.
At that moment——Azrad, who had been
quietly watching the situation, stood up abruptly.
“Uarda……!”
The woman, named Uarda, twisted her
lips into a sinister grin at the sight of Azrad—a smile that could only be made
by a monster in human skin.
A look of shock flashed across Azrad’s
face as if he had been doused in cold water. Then, his hands gripping the “Scimitar
of Barzai” tightened. The crimson crest on the black blade began to glow with
increasing intensity.
“No…… Loveday………… Raoul Loveday!!”
Azrad threw the Scimitar with all his
might. The extended blade of arcane power bisected the two large men standing
on either side of Raoul Loveday.
Yet, Loveday, who was in the center,
dodged upwards in a flash. He leapt approximately five meters instantly,
ascending higher into the sky as though kicking off the air——
[She flew……!?]
Loveday swept the sleeves of his robe
through the air. Suddenly, two bright red masses appeared in his hands, each
the size of an egg. The rubies transformed into scorching volcanic projectiles when
he recited a short incantation.
Hadou shouted.
“Not good——move away from the car!”
A twisted smile formed on his charming
lips as Loveday threw the burning jewels one by one at the car, then vanished into
the foggy sky.
Among the projectiles that left a
crimson-colored flaming tail, one was deflected by Azrad’s swinging Scimitar——but
the other struck the car’s internal combustion engine directly.
[Kyah!!]
“Uwoah!”
Hadou, holding the statue, along with
Ada and Crawford, tumbled onto the street, as the car exploded into flames
within the next second.
“——Al Azif!”
Azrad shouted as he was thrown from the
roof of the car.
“Yes.”
Al Azif answered Azrad’s call, and then——
*Rattle*——like flipping the pages of a
book, the girl’s body unraveled into bundles of papers in the air. Each and
every one of them was a Grimoire page inscribed with magic symbols.
The pages, fanned by the flames, swirled
and wrapped around Azrad’s body, becoming a tight-fitting black garment the
next moment. Glowing magic symbols emerged, continuously shifting upon the
fabric's surface.
In an instant, Azrad, clad in his
Magus Suit
, leapt into the air in pursuit of Loveday.
From his back grew black wings similar
to those of a devil. ——No, perhaps they were part of the suit as well.
Likewise, spell crests and magic
symbols also grew on the surface of the wings.
With a grand swing of his black wings,
Azrad’s body was absorbed into the misty night sky as he followed after Loveday.
[Another flying person……!]
In front of the startled Ada…… the
remaining ignited car wheel clattered across the road.
Hadou also looked up at the sky from
her side.
“Hmm hmm——he does seem to have mastery
of the Grimoire’s power.”
“——Sir.”
Crawford spoke as he stood up and fixed
his messy appearance.
“Um, what’s the matter?”
“We are surrounded.”
Before anyone realized it, a horde of
black beasts with glowing eyes had already caught up with the burning car, and
closed it on them.
+
The moment one dons the Magius Style,
Grimoire and Magus literally become one.
The esoteric
knowledge inscribed within the Grimoire seeps into the magus’ flesh and blood,
while the magic symbols that emerge from the surface of their suit and the
rune-enchanted beats
that
originated from their body enable effective manipulation of magic.
Knowledge is power——therefore, the
knowledge of magic is a “power” beyond human comprehension.
It is inhuman logic driven by human
will. Such is the true essence of magic. A being who is both human and non-human——this
is why a magus who has become one with their Grimoire can bring about
super-logical phenomena.
But precisely for that reason, a magus
must exercise superb self-control. For when they obtain powers beyond human
limits,
only
their willpower can keep them human.
But now——
Azrad has forgotten himself. The
archenemy he spent five years pursuing——the magus of
D∴D∴
, Raoul Loveday—was now the sole focus
of his mind.
(Azrad——don’t lose yourself, Azrad!)
Yet Al Azif’s words didn’t reach her
master.
The Magius Wings, engraved with the
crests of flying magic, cut through the sky with immense force. Azrad soared
above the foggy city below, climbing onto the moonlit sky——his
superhuman-enhanced eyesight caught sight of the robed figure rising in mid-air.
“Loveday!!”
Azrad raised the Scimitar. At that moment, numerous Voorish Signs appeared across his Magus Suit, resonating with the spell of “Magic Blade-Forging” repeatedly.
Power——
Power——
Give power——!!
They floated in the air around Azrad,
and when threw the Scimitar he was holding, the seven blades surged forward
after it. Each blade, imbued with a throwing spell, rotated around each other;
some accelerated rapidly while others decelerated as if to gather power, all
while tracing differing trajectories on their way towards Loveday.
*Flap*——the robe was shredded into rags
by the flying blades.
Raoul Loveday’s body swiftly flew away momentarily
as he remained in the air.
His naked brown skin shone under the
moonlight. All that lithe body carried was a Grimoire and a dagger. It was a fantastical
sight, but——
“……!”
Azrad abruptly stopped in mid-air.
“You are conflicted, Azrad.”
A raspy, repulsive voice came from the
lips of the young woman.
In Loveday’s left hand, the
blood-colored leather-wrapped Grimoire——the [Book of Bloodshed Prayer]—unfurled
and wrapped around the woman’s body, transforming into a crimson-colored Magius
Style similar to Azrad’s.
Next, Loveday pointed the tip of the
dagger in his right hand at his empty left palm, and thrust it in without hesitation.
His white palm was stained with blood——which glowed with ominous energy.
Loveday chanted his spell and swung his
left arm. The scattered droplets of blood became burning projectiles in the
air.
Azrad leapt away at the same moment,
deflecting the projectiles with the blades of his Scimitars as he closed in on
Loveday, slashing with all seven of the freely moving blades.
Loveday sneered as he dodged the seven
slashes and kept his distance. Azrad continued his pursuit.
The two magi soared across London’s sky
like monstrous birds. Loveday’s body danced carefree in the air, teasing Azrad
with every fierce attack he evaded.
Loveday wasn’t simply dodging Azrad’s
assault; he also took advantage of every opportunity to launch his own
projectiles in return. In contrast to Azrad, who was focused solely on
mindlessly attacking, Al Azif developed a protective spell on the exterior of
the Magius Style.
The uncoordinated use of attack and
defense magic unfortunately reduced its effectiveness slightly. Taking
advantage of that, Loveday slowly inflicted small but accumulating damage on
Azrad.
Predictably, Azrad slowed down before
long. His breath was ragged, and his brown skin was marked with several burns.
He threw the last of his seven blades, but it flew past Loveday, landing
fruitlessly behind him.
“Naïve, too naïve——but…”
A line of blood trickled down from the
cheek of the mocking Loveday.
It was the only result of hundreds of
slashes.
“As much as I would like to admire your
determination——heheheh.”
His husky chuckle changed into the sultry
laugh of an attractive woman.
“Eheheh——your blade was very hot.”
Loveday touched the wound on his cheek
and licked the blood away. Then, he opened the breast of his Magius Style suit
and grinned widely.
“So give me more love, Azrad——my
beloved!”
“——Bastard!!”
(Wait, Azrad, something is odd here——don’t
be taunted by the enemy!)
However, her words no longer reached
Azrad’s ears.
“Raoul Loveday——don’t you dare use her
face, her voice, or her tone ever again!”
The seven Scimitars slashed through the
air and returned below Azrad. One remained in his hand while the other six
pierced his body——no, the spell that constituted the blades was dismantled and
absorbed into his Magius Style.
“I shall erase
that form
from this world——!”
The magic power within the six blades
was absorbed, causing the glowing spell crests on his Magius Style’s skin to
dance wildly. Their light traveled through Azrad’s arm, concentrating on the remaining
blade.
Azrad
thrust the blade into the
air
with both hands as he spoke out a single name.
“Aeon!”
BOOM——
The atmosphere rumbled. The moon, the
clouds, and the earth trembled.
A being from beyond the dimensional
wall answered Azrad’s call.
*Scatter*——his black wings unraveled into
dozens of rectangular pages, drifting around Azrad in a circle. The Grimoire
used its “Chanting Form”, which allowed her to exert her maximum output.
Each page displayed a dizzying array of complex spell crests and magic symbols. The greatest and most powerful spell under the Grimoire [Al Azif]’s possession was unfolding on each page——the “Machine God Summoning”.
Azrad chanted the incantation with all of his might.
Thou art the wheel of time.
Thou art the blade of judgment.
Thou art the void hails from the end of eternity——
Eternal !
Nothing can escape from thee.
Everything thee touch shall not die even to death!!
BOOM——!!
A giant of steel manifested.
The “Winged God of Steel”, which had
been verbalized, condensed, and sealed within the Grimoire——the Deus Machina
“Aeon”—was unleashed within the magic formation and instantly materialized.
Shockwaves spread through its
surroundings, dispersing the night fog from the city below.
Azrad was integrated into the body of
the Deus Machina——no, the machine assembled itself with Azrad at its center.
The Grimoire remained in her Chanting Form and acted as the intermediary
between the Magus and the Deus Machina. Thus, the Trinity of Magus, Grimoire,
and Deus Machina was formed, allowing the artificial god to wield its might.
Now, the Deus Machina was the Magus itself, and the Magus was the Deus Machina
himself.
“Ooh!!”
Azrad = Aeon roared and slammed his
steel fist into Loveday, causing the air to shake.
However——although the summoning of a
Deus Machina enables the magus to demonstrate their
greatest
power, in some cases, it is not the
best
approach when dealing
with another magus. A battle between the magi is a game of
logic beyond
logic; as such, what determines the outcome is not always the speed or
mass of an attack.
That applied to the current situation.
Loveday’s body was knocked backward
lightly, much like when he had collided with the car not long ago. Even an
attack powerful enough to shatter mountains from the Deus Machina had no effect
on him.
(He’s defending himself with magic.
Normal attacks are useless.)
“Then——I just need to burn him!”
Scorching flames erupted from every
join in Aeon’s body. Its dark armor quickly burned red, casting a heat haze
around the unit. It was as if the space itself was melting.
Its palm brimmed with magic power and
intense heat, and thrust forward to catch Loveday. Unlike the previous strike,
even a grazing blow would be fatal.
But Loveday avoided it with a swift motion,
standing on the tip of Aeon’s nose by moving along the heat like a drifting
feather.
“What happened, Azrad?”
The voice of the woman was that of
mockery.
“I’m here——catch me if you can.”
“You bastard——!!”
At that moment, Azrad became enraged; Loveday
opened his left hand, launching two projectiles simultaneously.
They hit Aeon right in its eyes and
exploded on the spot.
Of course, these were not Azrad’s
actual eyes. This level of damage is easy to undo once the spell that
constituted the machine initiated repairs. Still, he certainly robbed the Deus
Machina of its eyesight, even if just for an instant.
“Heheh……”
Loveday’s laughter faded into the
distance.
——I can’t see——!?
He is——running——
Loveday is getting away!
……Did you think I would let you get
away!!?
But, my eyes——curse you!
(Azrad——Wait!)
“Oooh!!”
Azrad = Aeon howled.
(This is bad——!)
Al Azif seized control of the unit——but
it was too late.
The “Lamp of Alhazred”, the spiritual
combustion engine, was operating at maximum output within Aeon’s body, rapidly
draining the spiritual power of the magus. An explosive heat wave emanated from
all directions as Azrad’s will to “immolate” transformed Aeon into a small sun,
if only for a moment.
A sphere of light more than a hundred
meters in diameter, centered on the steel frame, engulfed Loveday’s body.
However, that attack also exceeded the
limits of Azrad’s own body and soul. Azrad lost his consciousness, and the
spell that materialized the unit lost its power as well.
The giant of steel quickly
disintegrated, as if being consumed by the very heat it had generated. Then,
Azrad’s body was exposed and engulfed by the intense heat that clung to the
surrounding space.
(Kuh——)
Al Azif shielded Azrad’s body with the
wings of Magius Style. The Grimoire and the magus merged into a black, web-like
mass, falling onto the streets of London.
+
Al Azif reflected on the scene from a
moment ago.
Loveday
laughed
as he was on the
verge of being consumed by the heat wave. He had fled the scene, leaving only
his scornful laughter echoing in space.
(He was a decoy.)
His true target was likely the stone
statue held by Hadou Kouzou.
Once he had separated and neutralized
Azrad, the beastmen under his command could finish the job. Hadou and those
around him were likely no longer of this world.
Putting aside the fact that Azrad was
blinded by his desire for vengeance, how could she have allowed herself to be
deceived by Loveday’s plan——
(……We’ve been had.)
Al Azif swallowed her bitter feelings
and spread the wings of Magius Style.
The wings descended slowly as they
carried Azrad’s limp, powerless body. To an onlooker, it resembled a giant bat
holding a human captive as it flew away.
Al Azif headed to the corner of the
street where they had left Hadou and the others.
——As both a Grimoire and a warrior who
has lived for over a thousand years, in that time she has witnessed countless
deaths. Those who fell into inhumanity in pursuit of their own desires or due
to an inescapable fate ultimately met their demise. Their number was greater
than mere thousands, and continued to increase ceaselessly. Today, several more
were added to that number.
That is all.
Because of that——Al Azif would verify
and record the final moments of her sacrifices within her pages. It might be
due to her inherent nature as a “book”.
The fight with Loveday lasted only a
few minutes. But that should have been
enough
time for them.
That was the scene Al Azif imagined——the
mutilated corpses of a man and a woman scattered around the smoldering remains
of a car.
However, what unfolded below her was——
+
In the center of the moonlit square, Hadou Kouzou, Crawford,
and Ada were protecting each other. They were still surrounded by more than ten
wild beasts.
[Eat this, and this! Geez!]
Ada swung her electric spear to repel the beasts.
Suddenly, a saber-toothed tiger leapt to her side, but,
“Hmph!”
Once again, a fist was unleashed from her side, smashing the
beast’s long fang.
[Wow, awesome! Are you a master in boxing?]
The one-eyed butler, Crawford, took a stance with the backs
of his hands facing forward as he looked at Ada.
“You praise me, ‘tis but a small bare-knuckle[13] trick——humph!”
With a powerful hook, he knocked out a gorilla in front.
“Both of you just hold on for a bit longer!”
Hadou held the stone statue’s package under his arm while he
fired his gun in quick succession,
“Oh——not good; I’m out of bullets!”
The moment he said so——
Projectiles leaving a red-colored tail landed in front of
him.
Looking up, he saw a woman in crimson Magius Style
standing
five meters above him.
Hadou smirked.
“You’ve returned, Raoul Loveday.”
“Hadou Kouzou——your reliable magus isn’t here anymore.”
Loveday spoke in a ragged, elderly tone while he laughed
with the face of an attractive woman.
Now that Azrad was gone, Loveday no longer needed to make
any exchanges.
“……Hand over the statue.”
“Hmm hmm.”
Hadou set down the package and pointed the empty gun at his
foot.
“Good. It seems that you’re a rational person.”
Said Loveday.
However, Hadou still kept a fearless smile on his face,
“Let’s see, how about this as a bonus……?”
He said, and pulled out a leather-bound book that was
attached to his waist with a leather belt.
“That is——a Grimoire!”
Loveday was shaking for a moment, then,
“Sha!!”
He swung his left hand and fired the stones.
But Hadou’s reaction was quick. He simultaneously drew the
emblem with his left hand and opened the Grimoire with his right——
*Rattle*——!
The fluttering Grimoire pages flew out of the book, forming a
shield of paper in front of Hadou.
The pentagram-shaped “Elder Sign[14]” that appeared on the
surface of the shield deflected the scorching projectiles.
“Curse you……!”
Loveday was about to swing his left hand again, but right
then…
Whoosh——!
A black blade grazed his head from the side. It was the “Scimitar
of Barzai”.
Azrad was in his coat, barely standing, and being supported
by the small shoulders of the girl, Al Azif.
“……Lo…… ve…… day…………!!”
His eyes burned with hatred as they locked onto Loveday.
Then——
Bang bang bang bang——!!
Suddenly, waves of bullets began to shower down upon the
stone pavement.
One after another, the beasts that were shot directly in
their heads or spinal cords fell and crumbled like tar.
“——!?”
Loveday looked up. Several bullet sparks were visible on the
skin of his crimson Magius Style.
“Thank goodness, finally
right on schedule.”
Hadou said.
A huge airship hovered in the London sky, blocking out the
moonlight. About twenty men, armed with rifles, emerged from the gondola.
“Tchh——!”
Loveday flew away from Hadou.
A horrifying expression of hatred formed on his beautiful
brown face.
“Hadou Kouzou! We will certainly take back the statue and
offer your blood as a sacrifice!!”
Loveday flew between buildings, leaving an aura of hatred
lingering in his wake. The surviving beastmen followed suit, departing like a
receding tide.
+
A group of men descended from the
low-altitude airship on ropes.
Standing at the front of the group of
men dressed like soldiers was a man who exuded the aura of a scholar; he was
the only one wearing a suit.
“Armitage[15]!”
Hadou called out to the man in the
suit.
“You should have come a little sooner.
I almost died there.”
The man in the suit, Armitage, took his
pocket watch, checked the time, and said without changing his expression.
“——No, the time was right. Mr. Hadou.”
Armitage’s subordinates, the men in
soldier uniforms——the “Miskatonic University Library’s Special Collections Department”—carefully retrieved what was left from the car and the remains of
the beastmen’s body tissues to erase any trace of this incident. They planned
to finish their work and withdraw from the area by dawn.
As Hadou watched the scene, someone
walked up to him.
“——Hadou Kouzou.”
“Hey there, Azrad. And——Al Azif.”
Azrad spoke while Hadou lifted his hat.
“Hadou Kouzou. Are you also…… a magus?”
“I’m
not a genuine one,
though.”
Hadou grinned as he lifted his
leather-covered book.
Glancing at the book, Al Azif said.
“I’ve never seen that Grimoire before,
but I can tell that its scent is
similar
to me. It must be some
kind of a copy.”
“Brilliant answer. This is a
translation of the [Book of
the Dead
]
Latin manuscript by Wormius[16]——”
*Flip*——Hadou turned over the pages and
showed its contents.
It was a strange Grimoire. No, to begin
with, its appearance was too bizarre to be called a “book”.
Neither pictures nor words were
depicted on those pages. There were just “holes”——countless circular holes that
were pierced systematically.
[They’re…… punch cards, aren’t they?]
Ada jumped into their conversation.
[——So, is this the aforementioned
“Machine Translation”?]
Hadou nodded as he raised the leather
cover engraved with a pentagon graphic.
“It is [Necronomicon Machine Language
Manuscript].”
“Machine Language……?”
When Al Azif showed a puzzled look,
“Milady~~?”
Nyala rushed towards them on her
electric bicycle, making a buzzing sound like that of a bee.
She saw Ada waving beside Hadou, parked
her bike close to them, and began to remove the helmet from Ada’s motor suit.
“Good grief, I was worried to death
when you suddenly boarded that weird carriage and drove off. And to make
matters worse, those terrifying sounds, winds, and light! I thought the world
was going to end or something. Just what was this pandemonium all about?”
Ada replied while her face was roughly
wiped by a wet towel.
“I have no idea——*Gag*——But from this
moment——*Gag*——Mr. Hadou Kouzou right here should be able to give us a
satisfactory explanation, right!?”
Ada opened the chest of her motor suit,
releasing steam from her collar area as she looked up at Hadou’s face. Her
cheeks were flushed as if they had been steamed, shining a rosy color as
flashed a daring smile.
“Mr. Hadou, I’d love to request another
interview with you. Yesterday’s meeting was interrupted abruptly, and those
monsters——no, unidentified creatures, the levitating figures, a winged giant
that materialized in the sky above the city, followed by an abnormal luminescent
phenomenon, in addition to that ‘Grimoire’——the mysteries are just getting
deeper.”
“Hmm…… Alright, I will allow it.”
“Well, of course, you would have your
own reasons for wanting to do so. However, backing down in the face of these
mysteries would be a violation of my pride as a journalist——eh?”
“Actually, I have something I want to
show you as well.”
There was a playful smile on Hadou’s
face as he brought his hat to his chest and bowed slightly.
“Young lady, would you like to come with
me to visit my headquarters in Arkham?”
“……I’d be glad to!”
Ada jumped for joy.
“Kyaah, we did it, Nyala! We’re going
to have an in-depth interview with the president of Hadou Enterprise!”
“——Cut it out.”
Ada, clamoring in her excitement,
stopped when she heard a grumbling voice.
The young man under a coat——Azrad—was
gazing at her with his dark eyes.
“Don’t get involved with the world of
darkness out of amusement.”
Ada pouted.
“I’m not doing this for fun. It’s my
job.”
“——Say, what are you going to do from
now on?”
Hadou lifted the “Manaus Statue”
package towards Azrad.
“Those guys are after this——if you come
with us, you won't have to nose around looking for clues.”
“I’ll defeat Raoul Loveday.”
Azrad said flatly.
“But I cannot guarantee your lives.
Drop that statue and leave.”
“Hmm, apparently you have no idea what
a business is.”
“……Don’t give me that crap, human.”
Al Azif, who had been standing in
Azrad’s shadow, moved one step forward, pointing her delicate palm at Hadou.
“We can just take away the statue after
turning all of you into
waste meat, here and now.”
“Oh my, what a pathetic excuse! You
should hear how audacious you sound!”
“Shut your mouth, little girl.”
Her jade green eyes, filled with a
chilling aura, glowered at Ada.
——Certainly, judging from the way she
fought against those beastmen from earlier, this mysterious girl——or something
that assumed the form of a girl——could end up killing five to ten people with a
single swing of her arm.
However, her pride as the “Knight of
Science” would not permit her to succumb to fear of the unknown. With a tap,
Ada beat her electric spear and returned Al Azif’s glare.
“But I’m not a [little girl].”
An air of tension arose between the
two.
Then——
“……You’re the one who shouldn’t take
humans so lightly. Al Azif.”
Hadou spoke. There was a hint of
concern within his provocative words.
“Humans are not as weak as you think.
After all, your master is a human being like us, isn’t he?”
“Azrad is different from you people.”
The avatar of the Grimoire answered.
“My master gave up his life for his
purpose and stepped into the same world I am in. Do you even have the guts to——”
Azrad’s hand was placed on the girl’s
fine shoulder.
“Al Azif…… Enough with unnecessary
words.”
The girl looked up at Azrad like she
wanted to object, but she held her tongue, and with a scattering sound——she
turned back into a Grimoire.
“Ah——”
Azrad’s eyes stopped before Ada as she
gasped.
No emotion whatsoever could be found in
his gloomy gaze.
“Wha…… What’s wrong!?”
Azrad immediately turned away from Ada,
whose eyes were wide open, and stashed the Grimoire in his pocket before
starting to walk. Then, as he passed by Hadou, he spoke to him without even
looking at him.
“Hadou Kouzou——if you, too, are the one
who fights evil, don’t be so naïve to think of something like a ‘united front’.”
Hadou lifted up his hat, smiling
carefreely.
“Oh, don’t say that.”
Azrad did not answer nor turn his head;
he just vanished into the street where the fog began to surface once more.
From behind Hadou, who watched him
leave,
“Hmph——what’s up with him? He’s such a
creepy guy.”
Ada snorted.
[Previous Chapter] [Main] [Next Chapter]
1 Also known as the East End of London, located east of the medieval City of London and north of the River Thames. The area was once notorious for poverty, overcrowding, and social problems. One of the most notable crimes is the serial killings by Jack the Ripper in 1888. ↩
2 An early model of electric lamp, which was first invented by English chemist and inventor Sir Humphry Davy in 1808. It used arc discharge between electrodes to produce light. Fluorescent lamps were later invented based on this principle. ↩
3 Her name was based on the American novel writer August William Derleth and the English mathematician Augusta Ada Lovelace. August Derleth was the literary executor of H. P. Lovecraft and the creator of the term Cthulhu Mythos, while Ada Lovelace was the genius who worked closely with the father of computers, Charles Babbage, on the Analytical Engine and was credited as the first computer programmer. Due to Derleth’s vast contributions to the Cthulhu Mythos genre, one of the major themes in Demonbane series was based on his works. ↩
4 The name of a street in Central London, often referred to as the center of British journalism and the British newspaper industry. Throughout history, most British national newspapers operated here. ↩
5 Based on Crawford Tillinghast, a character from H. P. Lovecraft’s short story “From Beyond”. He was a scientist who created a machine that could open gateways between worlds. ↩
6 A proposed automatic mechanical digital computer designed by English mathematician and computer pioneer Charles Babbage in 1837. It was the first general-purpose computer design and a precursor to modern computers, serving as the successor to Babbage’s Difference Engine. Its core principles of programming and computation are still relevant today. ↩
7 Charles Babbage (26 December 1791 – 18 October 1871) was the English polymath who invented the concept of a digital programmable computer and the creator of the first modern computer, the Analytical Engine. His computer theory was too advanced to be realized at that time, however. ↩
9 A slab of granitoid stone featuring a written decree issued in 196 B.C. by a group of Egyptians and their ruler, King Ptolemy V Epiphanes. The stone was engraved with Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs and demotic scripts and Ancient Greek texts. It was found by French officer Pierre-François Bouchard during the Napoleonic campaign in Egypt, July 1799 and later recovered by the British forces to analyze the description. Currently it is still being stored in the British Museum. ↩
10 Jean-François Champollion, also known as Champollion le jeune (23 December 1790 – 4 March 1832), was a French philologist and orientalist. He was the first scholar to be able to read ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs and successfully decipher them. ↩
11 Liber AL vel Legis, commonly known as The Book of the Law, is the central holy book of Thelema, written by Aleister Crowley in 1904. The book was dictated to his Holy Guardian Angel, Aiwass, who possessed his wife, Rose Edith Kelly. After the book was published in 1909, it became his most famous work to spread his belief system. One of Crowley’s pen names is Master Therion, serving as the original model of the major antagonist with the same name in Deus Machina Demonbane. Furthermore, the book’s title was used as the name of his Deus Machina, which was the very image of the stone statue in the story. ↩12 A street in Bloomsbury, London, it is best known as the location of the British Museum. ↩
13 Also known as bare-knuckle boxing or bare-knuckle fighting, the term refers to a full-contact boxing match without wearing any padding on the hands that originated in 17th-century England. In 1889, the rules were changed in the US that all participants must wear boxing gloves. ↩
14 The Elder Sign, known as “Sign of the Elder Gods”, is the fourth sign recorded in the book of Necronomicon. It is a pentagram-shaped symbol with a burning eye in the center that used to protect the casters from malicious forces and banish them. When the seal was engraved on the grey stone of Mnar, it would hold back the power of Great Old Ones for all time. ↩
15 Taken from Dr. Henry Armitage, the Head Librarian of Miskatonic University’s Orne Library. He was one of the main characters who first appeared in H. P. Lovecraft’s short story “The Dunwich Horror”. ↩
16 Olaus Wormius (3 May 1588 – 31 August 1654) was a Danish scholar from the 17th century. In H. P. Lovecraft’s fictional work “History of the Necronomicon”, he was credited as the Latin translator of the Greek version of the Necronomicon in 1228. ↩
0 Please Share a Your Opinion.: