Infinite possibilities

And then, “But will anyone really attack with such interesting timing?”

“They will,” replied Magic God Othinus immediately but with no real emotion. “But not
because the Anglican Church or the Roman Catholic Church are effective systems and not
because Ollerus and his group are powerful. ...It is because of my infinite possibilities as
a Magic God. My odds of success and failure are always half and half. The more work I
accumulate towards success, the more a card leading to failure will grow somewhere in
the world. It is like a shadow that follows my every move.”

“That isn’t good. Does that mean the enemy heading this way is you yourself?”

“Yes, in a way. I am telling you to knock back the misfortune that I call in. Do not think
you can manage this with any normal amount of effort. This is on a level high enough to
bind a Magic God.”

[...]

His objective was simple: stop Gremlin from creating Gungnir.

Magic God Othinus had obtained frightening power, but that power was too powerful. She
could not fully control it herself. Having infinite possibilities sounded good, but it meant
she had all positive possibilities and all negative possibilities. In this state, it was
impossible to predict whether she would win or lose a game of rock-paper-scissors with a
child.

No matter what she did, the odds of success and failure were always half and half.
To solve that dilemma, she had to twist those even odds to one extreme. To do that, she
needed a single lance:

Gungnir.

Once Othinus obtained that, the world would literally come to an end. There would be no
way of reversing the situation. A single human will would bring about a world where the
infinite reaches of history would be eternally under a tyrannical rule.

However...

Even Ollerus would have a hard time defeating Magic God Othinus in a direct fight. And
if Ollerus could not do it, it would be reckless to leave it to anyone else. That meant he had
to wait. He had to wait until that true Magic God had her hands full with the construction
of the lance.

-Shinyaku Toaru Majutsu no Index Volume 8 Prologue


She crushed one of the eight petals underfoot and stared at the face of the girl-shaped
specimen.

With one hand, she thrust her fingers toward that specimen’s chest as if attempting to
crush it.

The screaming and singing did not stop.

Othinus forced her hand inside and grabbed the area corresponding to a human’s lungs.
She squeezed like a pump to force air out.

“Othinus!?”

“Do you really think that empty husk will help us if he knows our plan will fail without
him? In the time we spent negotiating, the production of the spear would fail.” Othinus
used her one eye to stare at Marian. “Do it. We only need this thing to last the ten minutes
until you switch back over.”

“...”

The white flower crumbled. Brown and black stains and wrinkles spread across it, so it
could no longer be called “white”.

Even so, the voice continued.

Dark red blood trickled from Othinus’s eyepatch.

She had immense power, but things did not always progress as she wanted because her
infinite possibilities held an equal number of successes and failures.

Sticky sounds could be heard.

It was impossible to distinguish the sounds of the Magic God crumbling from those of the
flower crumbling.

Finally, the cruelly decomposed flower bent at the neck and the entire head fell to the
poolside floor. It completely burst with a splatting sound. It looked like the remains of a
fruit that no one had picked and not even any animals had shown interest in.

The singing stopped.

Marian Slingeneyer collapsed to a sitting position on the ground.

“We did it.”

“Not all of it.”

“Okay, fine. We managed to switch back. We can just sit back and watch the lance
complete itself. There is no way it can fail now!!”

“I see.”

The eyepatch-wearing girl removed her foot from the discolored remains of the flower
petal that had completely crumbled. It was reminiscent of a flower that was returning to
the earth after dropping its seeds and completing its role.

The core of Othinus shook.

“Othinus?”

“You said we can just take a nap now, right? I will focus on mending myself. If I did it here,
the great power could blow away the ceremony.”

“Then why don’t you rely on one of the other members? You still might not succeed, after
all. Let’s see, I think Iðunn and Sif are free, so-...”

The eyepatch-wearing girl held out a hand to stop Marian from continuing.

She then walked away from the pool.

As Marian Slingeneyer watched the girl leave, the other girl who had taken the form of a
black drum clattered next to her.

Marian looked toward the pool.

The lance had already reached two meters in length and a sharp blade was forming on the
end.
“Just a bit more,” she muttered.
The lance was intended to reach 250 cm.

“Just a bit more and you won’t have to go to all that effort, Othinus.”

With those last 50 cm, the world would change.

-Shinyaku Toaru Majutsu no Index Volume 8 Chapter 4 Part 14


“Why are you here? You have risked your life for this plan, so I doubt that was it. If it was,
I will kill you right this instant and return to producing the lance. I am a god of magic that
can bend the laws of life and death to help me in my fight. Did you think someone’s life or
death would be enough to stop my plan?”

“I’m glad you didn’t see through my plan all at once. That puts my mind at ease. It looks
like your infinite possibilities sent your power in the negative direction.”

[...]

It was a twisted method, but it was obvious what would happen if that spell struck Othinus
who had reached the territory of a Magic God.

“Even if all of mankind worked together, they would have no way of opposing the being
known as a Magic God. And that simple truth does not change even when one includes
those of us who only barely remain within the territory of a human,” said Ollerus.

He spoke of the beginning of a certain death.

“So instead of trying to bring mankind higher, I will drag you down. I will tear off your
wings, strike you from the air, and throw you to the throngs of people who can only crawl
along the ground. ...This is the end. Even if humans cannot kill a god, we can manage
against a fairy.”

“Gh...”

The eyepatch-wearing girl twisted her body and a groaning voice escaped her lips.

Was she trying to endure the pain?

Was she trying to suppress the rapid change occurring within her body?

Ollerus assumed that was the case.

“Heh heh.”

But he was wrong.

He was naïve.

Othinus’s shoulders shook and her voice reached his ears along with her sweet breath.

“Thank you, Ollerus.”

“...”

For an instant – just for an instant – even Ollerus’s mind went blank.

She laughed.

He could not even imagine why that girl’s shoulders would be shaking as she suppressed
laughter.

That was why it took him a moment to realize it.

Despite having pressed his palm against the center of the Magic God’s chest and having
fired the stake of light into her, the tip of that stake had not stabbed into Othinus. It was
not that a thick wall had appeared to stop it. Ollerus’s senses told him it had long since
extended all the way out, but Othinus’s senses said it was only partway out.

“It is a simple thing, Ollerus. A truly simple thing. I deceived your senses. You gave your
victorious speech before you had pulled out your secret weapon. That is all. And once you
know the trick, sleight of hand has nothing left to surprise you.”

“!!”

“Also...”

Ollerus frantically tried to pull his arm back, but he was too slow.

This had been a one-shot suicide attempt. He had given no thought to a way out.

Magic God Othinus did not hesitate to grab Ollerus’s wrist.

“I can make use of this now that I know it exists. It may have been a waste of time for you,
but it is an unexpected reward for me. After all, I finally have a way of finishing things
with this damn annoying person from my past! You brought the means of your own
defeat!!”

A great noise rang out.

Othinus had slammed her other hand against the young man’s chest. Her hand was palely
glowing. A sharp stake of light stuck out from her palm, thoroughly destroyed the interior
of Ollerus’s body, and forcefully shot out his back.

“Ha ha ha.”

She pulled back her hand and the stake sticking from it.

The young man’s body staggered.

The eerie and overwhelming presence from before was gone. It had all vanished.

“Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!”

The eyepatch-wearing girl’s back arched backwards as she laughed.

It was as if she felt this was much more of an accomplishment than completing the lance.

And...

The young man spoke even as it appeared he would collapse at any moment.

“My first hope failed, but my second hope is still on track.”

“...?”

Magic God Othinus’s eyebrows moved in pure confusion.

A moment later, another fairy stake accurately pierced straight through her heart.

“Dah...”

She did not even have time to turn around.

She mercilessly filled the space behind her with explosions that’s numbers reached at least
nine digits. Something was crushed and a great roar stabbed through the wrecked ships
piled up around them.

She could not breathe properly.

Othinus turned around with the awkward motions of a machine in need of oil. Finally, she
saw the second attacker.

“Fiamma...of the Right...!?”

“I performed a valuable experiment back in Academy City.”

The one-armed young man wearing red gave a slight smile while half-buried in the
wreckage of ships.

A dark red liquid trailed down from the corner of his mouth.

“I checked to see whether I could completely hide my presence on a battlefield filled with
powerful members of various powerful groups. It seems my method was effective even on
a Magic God. ...And thanks to that, I managed to hit you with the fairy spell.”

“I...” Ollerus brought a knee to the ground in intense exhaustion but still spoke with the
expression of the victor. “I no longer have any interest in being a Magic God. But I could
not allow someone to misuse that which I had hoped to be. To stop you and take away
your status as a Magic God, I do not regret giving up that which makes me special. ...You
misread that about me, didn’t you? That’s why you thought you had won from the moment
you turned me into a fairy.”

“.................................................................................................................................”

Now that it had come to this, the completion of Gungnir did not matter.

It was not a spiritual item that amplified a magician’s power. It was nothing more than a
tool to control a Magic God’s great power and make it easier to use. Now that Othinus had
lost her power as a Magic God, it would not benefit her in any way.

It was all over.

The infinite possibilities had left her grasp.

As those thoughts filled Ollerus’s mind, he saw something he could not believe.

Even a monster like him could not believe it.

“Heh heh heh.”

She laughed.

The eyepatch-wearing girl had not broken.

But that could not be. Ollerus could not believe it. He could see no way it was possible.
Othinus had been struck by the fairy spell and thus lost her power as a Magic God.
Creating the lance no longer had any meaning and Gremlin had lost the symbol behind
the organization.

There was nothing that could lead to her victory now.

Or at least, there should not have been.

“Even if I do not win, that’s fine with me,” said the eyepatch-wearing girl in a groan. “What
matters is unifying my infinite possibilities. Success and failure were always half and half.
No matter how much experience I built up and no matter how great a defeat I suffered, it
had no bearing on what would happen next time. I never knew which direction to work in
or which way to turn. ...I wanted the lance to escape that situation. Instead of having half
success and half failure, I would have 100% success.”

“You can’t mean...”

Ollerus finally caught on.

But this truth was truly a nightmare.

“You can’t mean!!”

“I only needed it to lean in one direction or the other,” she announced as a grin split across
her face. “It did not matter if I completed the lance and gained 100% success or became a
fairy and gained 100% failure. My actions were sealed by the constant 50% balance
between success and failure. I could never know if my actions had achieved heads or tails,
so I could never know if I could build on top of that action. Moving forward with constant
heads is one possible path. But if I know every path I choose will come up tails, I can
achieve 100% success by always moving in the opposite direction of the path I choose!!
Failing as a Magic God acts as a guidepost towards success as a Magic God!! ...You two
meant nothing from the beginning. Whether I won or lost, you could not stop me from
becoming a complete Magic God!!”

If she had won, she would have become a complete Magic God.

If she had lost, she would have become a complete Magic God.

“That’s why that Imagine Breaker was so irritating! In a way, it did hold the possibility of
driving me to 100% failure, but its role as a reference point and repair point for the world
meant it clashed with my desire to change the world. With that method of achieving 100%
failure off the table, I had no choice but to invite 100% success with the lance. I never
thought you would bring such an interesting alternative approach!!”

She had only needed to obtain one extreme or the other.

“Ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!! I was afraid of ending up in a twisted situation where I
thought I was constantly failing but hit a dead end while walking down the opposite path.
Once you reach my level, it is hard to experience such a thorough defeat that it is
impossible to recover. That is why I had hoped you would do it for me. I knew you would
eventually come to kill me! You really are a genius! Ha ha. A genius at being used by me
no matter what you do!!”

By the point Othinus had built up that plan, her battle against the world had essentially
been over. No matter what the result, she would accomplish her goal. The lance had not
been an irreplaceable piece of her plan. It had been nothing more than one of a few
different branches on a chart. And she had managed to hide that fact.

“So let me say it again: thank you,” declared the eyepatch-wearing girl with a smile
splitting across her face. “To use your own words, the lance was my first hope and not
using it was my second hope. I can’t deny that this is making me feel a bit ill, but the end
result is the same. Now, the time has come for me to spread my wings. I will rule over this
world in my proper form!!”

No one had done anything wrong.

Her plan had been made so this result would be reached no matter what anyone did.

“...”

“...”

Ollerus and Fiamma of the Right exchanged a quick glance.

And they both took action.

“Success and failure, heads and tails... None of it matters to me anymore,” said the girl
with the smile splitting her face. She spread her arms as if welcoming an old friend. “After
coming this far, do you really think you have any chance of fighting back? The two of you
were only able to crawl through the dirt because you could not leave the territory of fragile
children of man. Kneel before me as you witness history. This is 100% success!!”

[...]

Magic God Othinus alone smiled.

“It’s already over. You were too late. ...But none of that matters now. This was destined to
happen whether you were late or early.”

“...I was too late?”

Kamijou’s eyelids twitched oddly.

He could not believe it.

“Are you saying that the lance...that Gungnir was already completed!?”

“Oh, the lance,” said the eyepatch-wearing girl with the look of someone recalling a trivial
fact. “Marian Slingeneyer failed. Hawaii, Baggage City, and the attack on Academy City
over Fräulein Kreutune all ended in failure. Ollerus destroyed it all.”

“...?”

He could not relax even for an instant.

Despite what she said, Othinus was not concerned or angry.

“But none of that ever really mattered.” The eyepatch-wearing girl gave a light shrug.

“The lance was nothing more than an item used to complete my position as a Magic God.

As long as I had a way of doing that without using the lance, it didn’t matter at all. For
example, there was the one and only means of killing me that Ollerus secretly developed.”

“...”

“Also, all of Gremlin’s actions may have been working toward the production of the lance,
but that was not necessarily the only way of creating it. The method using Dvergr Marian
Slingeneyer was just one more decoy. I could have made the lance on my own, but if I
revealed that, all of you might very well have interfered. I went out of my way to gather
those weaklings and had them carry out that decoy plan alongside my own. It was all so
all of you would work to stop that decoy instead.”

“You’re...kidding...”

“About what? That I could so easily overturn the assumption that there was only one
method of producing the lance? Or that my subordinates and your comrades could be so
easily deceived?” mockingly asked the eyepatch-wearing girl. “Did you know this? The
Norse god from whom I took the name Othinus is known as the god of war, magic,
art...and also betrayal. He would deceive people to spread chaos and cause unnecessary
disputes all to more efficiently gain the souls of dead warriors. ...All of your information
about that lance was spread by me. Gremlin and its enemies were manipulated by the
information they found where I had conveniently left it for them. No matter what anyone
says, that is the truth. Even Ollerus was deceived.”

“.......................................................................................................................................”

Kamijou could not keep up with the situation.

His brain refused to comprehend the information.

The great organization known as Gremlin had shaken the world so greatly, but all of that
had been pointless effort that held no meaning?

Hawaii, Baggage City, and the fighting over Fräulein Kreutune had been nothing but a
safety measure meant to hide the true time limit?

She had done it all alone.

The eyepatch-wearing girl known as a Magic God had manipulated the entire world.

“Now, it’s time for some fun.”

Kamijou heard a sound like a rock landing in some mud.

It came from the head of the blonde-haired, green-eyed girl named Othinus.

The black eyepatch was pushed out from within. An object covered in a dark red liquid
shot out from the empty eye socket. It continued on and on.

“Ha ha ha ha!! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!”

The Magic God laughed arched her back.

An unpleasant noise rang out.

The tip of the lance was not a sharply pointed blade like on a knife. It was a wide blade as
if a double-edged sword had been forcibly attached. What would happen if that was
forcibly dragged from her narrow eye socket? The sound of a joint popping continued on
and on with a sticky sound mixed in. No, that was the sound of something breaking and
splitting. Her eye socket may have been spreading and distorting like a hole in a rubber
band. It may have even grown larger than the girl’s small face.

“...Ah...”

Kamijou Touma’s body froze as if paralyzed while he watched this overwhelming sight.

He could do nothing but watch.

He could not even guess how much pain that would cause.

He could not imagine what was going on in that girl’s head as she continued to smile.

And...

A lance covered in a dark red liquid made its horizontal entrance into the world.
Othinus grabbed the Gungnir she had produced from within her own body and looked
down on Kamijou once more.

Her face had returned to normal.

Had it truly possessed the strange elasticity of rubber?

Or had she somehow instantly repaired her smashed and destroyed skull?

“Either 100% success or 100% failure would have completed my status as a Magic God.”

“Ah...”

“Thanks to all of you, I have gained both solutions at once! Do not think of me as a mere
Magic God any longer. I will now show the world what Othinus truly is!!”

“Ahhhhhhhh!! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!”

He shouted, screamed, and cried out.

Finally, Kamijou Touma was freed from the bonds keeping him frozen in place.
Without paying any attention to his surroundings, he ran so he could get as close as
possible to Magic God Othinus. She stood atop the towering passenger ship, so there was
no way the boy’s legs could have brought him to her. However, he was afraid his mind
would collapse if he did not oppose her in some way.

And...

Magic God Othinus lightly spun the lance around in one hand and pointed its tip toward
the heavens.

She spoke slowly.

She uttered two short sentences.

“These small fights are such a pain. I think I’ll just end the world.”

And exactly as she had announced, everything was immediately destroyed.

-Shinyaku Toaru Majutsu no Index Volume 8 Epilogue