Chapter - 7

Late at night on the second-to-last day of Kyomon and Hagun's combined training camp, it was unfortunately raining. Not strongly enough to be a storm, but large powerful drops were coming down and hitting the windows noisily. While listening to it as if it was a rather delightful sound, Hagun Academy's newspaper club chief, Kagami Kusakabe, was in the accommodations kindly lent to the newspaper clubs of all the schools by the nearby institution. She was sorting through the data she had gathered during the training camp period.

Under the small light of the desk were many basic documents, the contents of many interview transcripts, and the information on each school's team traded between the newspaper clubs. The thing displayed on the laptop resting on the stack of documents was information on other schools' training camps collected by her staff members.

Checking all of that information from a big-picture perspective―the trends of the seven schools during this training period and the analyses of their respective fighting power―would allow her to come to a conclusion about the number of special cases during this Seven Stars Sword-Art Festival.

―It was the kind of work that would lead to discovery.

The imputus for this was the telephone call from Ikki who had been worried about Amane Shinomiya.

Speaking frankly, Kagami wasn't very interested in Amane Shinomiya. There were surely many mysteries among the teams. The powers they held were often not clearly known. But that was not just limited to the nameless newcomers who had no experience from the middle-school league. To begin with, the schools didn't go around blabbing about their Blazers' abilities, because there was no benefit to revealing one's own team members' information.

Moreover, this year there were several participants, not even including Amane, who had not been experienced representatives during the middle school years. Because of this, Kagami hadn't recognized Amane as more than one of the nameless newcomers, so she hadn't felt like investigating him deeply.

Ouma Kurogane, the Sword Emperor of Wind. Stella Vermillion, the Crimson Princess. And Yuudai Morboshi, the current Seven Stars Sword King. There were contenders who attracted more people's attentions.

However, Ikki's phone call had caused interest in Amane to sprout in a corner of her mind, so Kagami had searched through the data on the seven schools to casually satisfy that interest. As a result―

"…What is… this…?"

Kagami was astonished. Though the mountains of Tohoku were cool even in the summer, beads of cold sweat dripped down her back. What was in front of Kagami's eyes was Amane Shinomiya's school grade report that she had gotten at great effort. The results of coursework-mandated mock battles were there.

Six battles, six wins―six victories without combat.

Kagami had collected the mock battle summaries for many contenders as part of the newspaper club, but she had never seen a record as weird as this.

No, wait, if I'm talking about things I haven't seen before….

She's probably seen a battle record as odd as Amane's before, right? What she hadn't been paying attention to up until now, Kagami was forced to remember.

…Entering the Seven Stars Sword-Art Festival himself as a nameless newcomer. There's never been anyone like that before.

It was an ordinary trend. If she thought of how things have been up to now, wouldn't that be expected? People who had power would desire everything they see in the world. In this world, there were many influential people who chose to be representatives in their first year, but…

It's as if someone had gathered all the people in the world who hadn't shown up until now.

Suddenly, Kagami felt it. As if she was in the process of realizing something preposterous. And that realization was preposterous even for someone who wasn't a student.

But because of that, I can't let it go.

Because she remembered that sense of discomfort, not investigating would be….

She was a reporter. Therefore Kagami gathered up all of her materials and questioned the discomfort within her. The information about all the seven schools' representatives. The schools' board members, and the members of the Seven Stars Sword-Art Festival steering committee. Furthermore, the list of sponsors collaborating with the administration. She examined the big picture of all the components of the Seven Stars Sword-Art Festival.

―And after a few hours had passed, it was the dead of night. Kagami Kusakabe had come to a conclusion. The exceedingly high abilities that she had polished as a reporter every day, they had arrived at the truth she had come to realize.

There's no mistake.

Kagami stared at the list of names in this year's Seven Stars Sword-Art Festival, the names of the seven schools' representatives, and moaned.

"…Among the seven schools, there's… an extra one…!"

At that moment. Burning heat penetrated Kagami's back.

"―Eh?"

In front of the documents Kagami was looking at, she could see a dark gray knife emerging from her chest for a moment.

Kagami knew the shape of the knife that was illuminated by her desk lamp.

…I… knew… it."

The knife that emerged from Kagami's chest was the Device called Darkness Hermit. And the owner of that Device was….

"A…lice…-chan…."

Mustering the last of her strength, Kagami shifted her focus behind her. There, she saw a cold face that looked nothing like the schoolmate she saw every day.

Her schoolmate―Nagi Arisuin opened the lips on that cold face. Without a trace of emotion, a voice emerged from those corpse-like lips.

"You're a little bit too smart."

And then he withdrew the knife, making a squelching sound. At the same time, Kagami's body fell to the floor among the mountain of documents.

You can't….

She didn't have any strength to lift her body or run away. The forced blackout from a fatal wound delivered in illusionary form stole away Kagami's consciousness.

Senpai… Stella-chan… watch out….

So Kagami prayed. From her throat that could no longer c

ry out, she tried to at least deliver her hopes.

This year's Seven Stars Sword-Art Festival… is hiding a monster…!

And so, Kagami Kusakabe fell into darkness.