Horizon:Volume 8C Chapter 84

Chapter 84: Transmitter in the Batter’s Box

So

How much of this

Follows the rules of baseball?

Point Allocation (Does Any of It?)

“Indeed I have,” he said from a point 200m north of the transport ship. “Because I, Pedro Valdes, could never win the nationals with a magic ball that requires I pitch alongside my sister.”

He raised a pair of metal balls and prepared a pitch toward the transport ship.

“Now, who is my opponent? I will use everything I have to defeat them.”

Some people emerged from the top of the transport ship: the Musashi group. They all pointed at Valdes and spoke as one.

“He’s the one!”

“Hey, it’s great to see you again! Congrats on making it to the final four!”

“Are you waiting for something? What do you want!?”

Valdes nodded at the shouted question from the Mito Lord in the lead.

“I want to know who my opponent is.”

Musashi’s princess answered while pointing his way.

“All of us.”

“Judge!”

The entire Musashi group charged his way.

“It looked like he wanted to set up a 1-on-1 match, so this makes us seem kind of bad! Oh, no! We’re the bad guys!”

“Do not be ridiculous, Adele-sama. Single combat is an outdated concept. It hasn’t been relevant since the Mongol invasions of the Far East,” said Horizon.

“What about all those duels we’ve been fighting?”

Valdes took his pitching stance up ahead. Noriki raised his head.

“Here it comes!”

“You aren’t handling this one?” asked Mitotsudaira.

“I’m not prepared for it. A direct hit could break some ribs and Ujinao would be upset if I came home like that. You don’t want Ujinao reverting to her old self and storming the place, do you?”

“Good point! Someone other than Noriki-dono needs to handle this one!” said Tenzou.

“Very well!” said the lieutenant of the warriors. He turned back toward Futayo. “Captain! Leave this to me!”

He took a direct hit.

He was blasted into the air where Persona-kun caught him and left him with the rescue squad behind them. Finally, everyone looked to Futayo, who was carrying Masazumi.

“Hey, your lieutenant was one-shotted!”

“Judge! A noble sacrifice! Glasses boy! What’s our next move!?”

“Eh?”

Gold Mar: “That’s all you have, Bara-yan? ‘Eh?’ ”

Novice: “A-and your attack missed earlier!”

Art-Ga: “Sure, but at least we did our job. You haven’t done squat.”

Novice: “Someone help! This Technohexen is using theoretical arguments against me!”

But there was still a fair amount of distance between them and Valdes. And during the time that gave them…

“Heh heh! There, I think!”

Their ranks parted where Kimi pointed just before a pair of metal balls appeared there. Two or three warriors weren’t quick enough, but they were already beginning their evasive action.

“Kh!”

It only grazed their shoulder or arm, but it still sent them flying into the other warriors who had gone the other way.

The ranks supported them.

“You alright!?”

“Damn, that was a nonrotating pitch!”

Valdes was already entering his next pitching stance. Blue fire burned in his hands, telling them this would be a magic ball as well.

But as fast as the Musashi group was running, they were still more than 100m away. Asama turned toward Persona-kun.

“I’ll fire on him, so-”

“No, Tomo. That would be too high to match the balls’ paths.”

So…

“I will do it!”

The wolf swung her chains and pulled out ahead.

Mitotsudaira gave herself a burst of speed.

She closed the distance between her and her opponent and she swung the silver chains.

Her opponent was using a spell. She understood the basics of the magic ball from reading the Armada battle records. But this was a new and improved version.

If she could see where the magic ball was, she could handle it. That was the inherent rule behind the magic ball spell, but she couldn’t actually respond to it without understanding how it worked as a spell.

…It must be a type of concealment spell.

If she could see through it, she would win. And…

“Fun fact,” said Valdes, beginning another pitch. “No one defeated this magic ball at the nationals. Which is hardly surprising.”

That was when Mitotsudaira noticed something. The Armada battle records had said Valdes used an overhand pitch. But now…

…A side arm pitch!?

Mitotsudaira swung the silver chains.

The vanishing magic ball worked by colliding a pair of pitches with a certain divine protection applied. That would give them identical positional data on an ether level rather than a physical one, so they would negate each other’s position and briefly disappear. Noriki’s battle records were enough know the pitched balls themselves were traveling through the ley lines.

Meanwhile, the silver chains were divine weapons capable of striking ether. In the same way they would attack ether beings, they could hit the balls in the ley lines. Plus, the chains were long, so if she used them as a bat…

…I know I can hit the balls if I swing soon enough!

She swung. She did so while running, but it was a full-power righthanded swing. She gathered strength in her right hand and…

“Homerun!”

Immediately, the warriors behind her were blasted into the air.

Noriki swung his right hand up into the air.

“Striiiiiiike one!!”

Whose side are you on?

What just happened? wondered Mitotsudaira.

The enemy’s projectiles moved fast. She quickly pulled her silver chains back, but she had swung them at the earliest timing.

Yet it hadn’t been quick enough. And…

…Huh?

She suddenly noticed something between her and the enemy. But before she could figure out why…

“Heh heh. The next one is coming. Right there!”

Everyone screamed and managed to get out of the way this time. A pair of metal balls enveloped in blue flame appeared out of nowhere there.

“Guts!”

The lieutenant had just finished receiving first aid, so he stopped them by grabbing them between his arms.

Mitotsudaira noticed the two balls were lined up front to back.

…So does it work the same as last time?

When the lieutenant passed her one of them, she confirmed the question growing in her mind.

“What is this?”

There was a mark on it. She knew that had to be a hint to figuring out the magic ball’s trick.

But knowing that didn’t tell her how to fight back. The enemy’s pitches were clearly faster than would be expected from the pitching motion. Meanwhile, Noriki swung his arm up in response to that pitch.

“Striiiiiiike two!!”

Again, whose side are you on?

Gold Mar: “Noririn’s super into this, huh?”

Unturning: “Isn’t that pitcher supposed to be our enemy?”

Laborer: “Yes, but I know the Valdes Siblings from the Armada battle. And I feel like he deserves to have at least one person on his side here.”

Flat Vassal: “H-he does have people here! Like, a whole bunch!”

Mitotsudaira considered a few theories. She wanted to keep a close eye on Valdes, but she also wanted to focus on something else. But as she ran toward him…

“One more strike and you’re out.”

“W-we’re using those rules!?”

Oops, Mitotsudaira belatedly realized.

…Was this supposed to be a duel!?

If she screwed this up, who would step up to take her place? No, the rest of the Tres Españans would probably catch up and this charge would devolve into a brawl. The Tachibana Couple were dealing with the baseball players to the east and west, but the groups from the north and south remained untouched and Valdes here was the first of them to arrive.

If they took too much time here, they would have a much harder time getting into the imperial palace. So…

“I’ll finish this here!”

Valdes nodded in response. He had already taken his pitching stance. Mitotsudaira had to quickly swing her silver chains. For some reason, his pitches had their speed boosted. So she had to increase her speed too.

“Nate.”

Her king’s voice reached her.

“Swing lefthanded.”

Valdes saw the enemy change her batting form for this pitch.

Doing that during a pitch was against the rules, but she wasn’t actually a baseball player. That was obvious enough from her stance. Any combat training would have taught her to use both arms, but people still had a dominant side. So…

…Why change now?

It doesn’t make sense. Then again, nothing Musashi does ever makes sense and trying to figure it out is a waste of time. Lady Juana said that repeatedly during the strategy meeting. I tried to demonstrate my understanding by expressing my outrage at how they made her grab their Chancellor’s dick, but she only yelled at me for that.

…So this must be the same as the dick.

“Sister, this is likely your brother’s last time to take the mound,” he whispered while making the pitch. “Disappear! My magic ball!”

Mitotsudaira saw Valdes’s pitch.

She had a theory, but if this was what she thought it was…

…Can I make it in time!?

She had already begun swinging the silver chains. With faster timing this time. But…

“Kh.”

Given the previous span of time from pitch to impact, the swing was too slow. This was the fastest she could manage, but it was too slow.

…If only I could get my bursts of acceleration to affect the chains.

Her mind sought out a logical explanation and was ready to give up, but…

“Nate, check this out.”

She heard her king’s voice and something else in her ear: a quiet sound she had heard several times the day before. It was a damp and pleasant but embarrassing sound.

“––––––”

She gasped and her fingers jumped. Sudden power reached her left hand’s fingers.

…Oh.

A burst of speed traveled through her left shoulder, elbow, wrist, fingers, and finally the silver chains.

Valdes saw something in that moment.

The silver chains gained a sudden burst of speed, but more than that…

…She shut her eyes!?

Was that because his magic ball disappeared? But the timing of it confirmed his concerns.

…Did she do it!?

A solid sound of impact rang out like a wave.

She had hit his pitch.

Asama heard multiple sounds at once.

She saw the color silver fly in a horizontal circle and then race outwards

The color scattered blue light into the air.

There were two of them. The silver chains had found Valdes’s metal balls.

Mitotsudaira got a hit.

Asama honestly didn’t know how Mitotsudaira had figured out the trick behind the magic ball and hit them. She considered asking Mitotsudaira later and spreading the story around.

But she had also noticed the chains’ unusual speed. Mitotsudaira had always swung them with brute force, so their speed was generally constant.

…But it looked like the center rushed out in front for a second there.

She knew what must have happened. The burst of acceleration Mitotsudaira could send throughout her body had reached the chains.

She had tried that several times during their time in hiding, but it hadn’t gone well. So why had it worked now?

“Um, Toori-kun?”

Asama turned around to find him biting his own index finger.

Yes. He and Mitotsudaira had bitten each other’s fingers yesterday. And Mitotsudaira had just used her left hand’s fingers, which included the bitten one.

That was the trick behind the wolf getting the acceleration to the chains.

But it wasn’t just the biting.

“That was transmission, wasn’t it?” Kimi smiled bitterly. “Mitotsudaira isn’t Catholic and she doesn’t worship the Asama Shrine’s Sakuya. She’s an Ootsubaki follower, the same as my foolish brother. She made the switch when she decided to be his knight, but Ootsubaki is an entertainment god.”

So…

“Entertainment gods provide spells that support the transmission of emotions and thoughts. But…”

“But what? That wasn’t a spell she used there,” pointed out Asama.

“This was something more fundamental than a spell. Surely you understand. What happens when someone you love suddenly sits next to you or touches you? It’s embarrassing, but you jump, don’t you?”

Kimi gave an exaggerated jerk of her shoulders and moaned, “Ah, what, Toori-kun?”. Is that supposed to be me? I don’t recall ever saying anything that disturbing.

“Heh heh. But that jump is an extremely small reaction. It’s a subtle thing because you can’t let the other person notice it. But it is still a movement of the muscles and bones.”

Asama knew where Kimi was going with this.

“Are you saying Mito never learned how to use the subtle sort of force needed to control the chains?”

“You mustn’t confuse weapons and tools with love and romance. Mitotsudaira needs to teach her entire body how to do this. Otherwise she might destroy my foolish brother with a hug. …By the way, foolish brother, was the finger sucking meant to hint at this?”

“No, it just felt right at the time. I guessed Nate had done that before as a kid, but not for a long time. I did think I’d be in trouble if she used her strength on me, so I figured there was nothing to fear if I did that.”

So…

“Since we had done that, I thought her finger would be sensitive to touch right now.”

That meant he probably had figured all that out. And most likely it happened…

…During the Kantou Liberation.

He had caught Mitotsudaira, been pushed down by her, and held her. That had led him to figure out why she rarely made any moves in his direction. It had looked like she had mastered her bursts of acceleration, but she actually couldn’t use it when holding or embracing something.

So he must have wanted to start at the beginning on teaching her this, which also meant…

…He’s going to keep doing that sort of thing with Mito.

Makes me want to slap her on the shoulder and tease her a bit, but she probably sees me the same way. And at the moment…

“I dedicate this victory to you, my king!” said the wolf.

As the two metal balls fell, she caught one in her left hand and struck the other from below so it would rest atop the first.

Then Noriki made his call.

“Interference! Batter out!!”

Whose side are you on, Noriki-kun?

Valdes did not watch as the St. Elmo’s Fire scattered and vanished from his arms.

He moved to the west of the main street and let the Musashi group pass.

…Well played!

His magic ball had been defeated by a first-time opponent. That was as close to a complete defeat as he could think of.

He was impressed she had seen through it. After all, she had aimed her hit for where the pitch split into two.

“That disappearing magic ball used multi-stage acceleration.”

The idea was simple. Before, the pitch had disappeared when the balls collided, but this time he had adjusted the divine protection so they would collide again within the ley line. But instead of canceling each other out again, they added to each other.

That gave a single pitch twice the speed.

But the balls couldn’t be seen since they had disappeared from the previous collision.

However, the switch from canceling out to addition required them to split apart inside the ley line, which made them unstable.

…That was the only moment a batter had.

He used a side arm pitch for this one. That let him hold the two balls in his palm. An underhand pitch would throw them with too much force and an overhand pitch would make it too easy for the balls to slip from his hand.

And since the spell required an early collision, he had to throw them both nearly simultaneously.

He first threw the one resting on the wrist side of his palm and then threw the one he was accelerating by catching it with his fingertips.

The collision very nearly happened in his hand.

Since the nationals included nonhumans with more than the usual number of arms and legs, it was sometimes allowed for a player to use multiple bats or pitch multiple balls. That came with a penalty of disallowing intentional walks, but they had still made it to the final four.

No one had actually hit it. But…

“Senpai! Your form was great there at the end!”

The baseball team greeted him from the side of the main street. Especially the catchers. All of the catchers were injured, with bandages around their arms and elsewhere.

No one could properly catch that magic ball yet.

But since it had been defeated here, perhaps the disappearing magic ball was a thing of the past.

The Musashi group passed him. He asked a question of the silver wolf in the lead.

“How did you figure out the trick?”

“Judge. Because…”

She tossed him one of the balls. He saw something on its surface.

“They had your blood on them.”

That explained it. It wasn’t just the magic ball. Any pitcher would place their blood or an equally valuable emotion within the balls they used. But…

“I couldn’t see anything, but I could still smell something there. So I asked myself why I would smell blood between us when I couldn’t see anything.” The wolf tossed the other ball to him. “The divine protection and spell used for your magic ball must only work when your god recognizes your effort. So that smell is the true essence of the pitch. That’s something separate from whether or not the physical ball is visible. That divine connection acts like a sign pointing to the magic ball and it won’t disappear so easily.”

“Testament. That would mean that my magic ball really was accepted by god.”

Valdes caught the falling ball.

“Captain! Lady Juana! Captain Fusae! This is as far as I go! The rest is in your hands!”

'’Then I’ll have to do something about this, thought Fusae.

She swung Byakko’s arm and took an attack stance while viewing both sides of the battle.

…We’re both pretty worn down.

Neither god of war had much undamaged armor left.

They both knew what the other was capable of. She had honestly been worried when the enemy had pinned down Byakko’s arm and thrown it. She had created a Path in the air and immediately circled behind the enemy, but the battle could have ended there if she had let the surprise get the better of her.

Those thrusters were a pain.

Suzaku itself was skinny, but it held steel weapons and placed its acceleration behind each attack.

Its body didn’t have that much power to draw on, but its flight momentum made up for that.

And the enemy was getting better at using that as the battle progressed. This type of movement was probably based on the battle the enemy had fought in Satomi during the Kantou Liberation. Any god of war pilot would know the traits of each nations’ gods of war, but…

“The eastern nations have more precise control with their flight devices than we do.”

…We have more power, though.

The El Azor was primarily used as a gunner because it had high-power flight, but was bad at midair close-quarters combat. They had felt a need to fix that and thus the Cavaleiro Azor was born. I didn’t expect all of those to be shot down by Muneshige-kun and Gin-chan, though. Oh, the Tachibana father is a god of war, so maybe they’re used to dealing with them.

“Oops!”

Fusae widely dodged one of Suzaku’s attacks.

The main street’s pavement was already badly broken, leaving a patchwork of visible earth, but she had just taken an advantageous position.

…The transport ship is visible dead ahead.

Her position and timing were perfect. The track team was directly past that transport ship while pursuing the enemy. And if that ship formed a wall…

“I’ll just have to push her into it!”

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