Chapter 38: Northern Italy And A Certain Lavender Haired Girl
When their vacation ended, Academy City's world renown Daihasei Festival was about one day from ending as well. With that being said, Ester still had not gotten the full student life experience, if anything she didn't even get to try anything of that sort. However, she still made an effort to explore the remaining stalls in the Daihasei Festival.
They had games as well as plenty of snacks for her try and she crushed every single one of the games and managed to try almost all the snacks there. However, she was only alone.
"Being alone doesn't really feel good."
She mutters under her breath as she approached the last station all the way at the end.
It was a lucky draw station. But the first prize was riddled with question marks. She did not think she was a lucky person, she only thought she was just getting things done by chance, but of course that could also mean luck. However, she did not think much about it.
She took her chances and paid 500yen for a card which she had to write the estimated number of people that would be attending the Daihasei Festival and hand it over to them. Finally, the number closest to the actual target would get the largest prize, and so on and so forth.
The stall attendant was a high school student from Kirigaoka Girls Academy, a prestigious school filled with rich girls all around.
Wearing a short-sleeved sports shirt and red tights, the athletic female attendant looked at something from under the counter and her eyes widened in shock as she looked back at Ester.
"Congratulations! The number you had just bought was the exact number of people who had attended the festival! You won the first prize which is a seven days, six nights, two person trip to Northern Italy!"
---20th September 3:42p.m.---
"And that was how I won the first prize!! Isn't that shocking?!"
Ester was in Accelerator's ward showing off the feats of her luck. It was truly something to behold as guessing an exact number would be extremely lucky and very difficult to pull off, but she did it.
"Yeah? Good for you."
Accelerator was resting on his bed, facing the opposite way from the girl. He had no interest whatsoever to go on another trip. He just wanted to lie on his bed and just sleep for the whole day, as usual.
However, the blonde haired girl in his ward was persistent.
"Would you like to follow me?"
"No thank you."
His answer was immediate and he did not hesitate or stutter in between. It was made clear he wouldn't leave his bed unless he had to. In this case, he didn't have to.
"But why?"
Ester said as she looked at him with big puppy eyes, trying to coerce him into following her.
But his response was simple.
"You want to know why? Firstly, I have no passport. Secondly, I am dead fucking tired from the vacation that we had. Lastly, I'm a patient who is not supposed to be leaving until the end of this month. So, does that answer your question?"
Ester looked at him with a puzzled expression it seemed like she did not know what he was talking about.
"Passport? We need passports to go out of Academy City?"
"Ha? What do you mean if we need passports? It's an obvious thing that someone like me even knows. How did you even get into Academy City?"
"I was brought into Japan by a private jet and I was instructed to sneak into Academy City."
Accelerator sat up on his bed and looked at her with a confused look. Academy City is not a place where one can easily say they SNUCK in, the security is shut tight by the walls around them and climbing it by itself would draw a lot of attention as it would trigger the alarm systems.
"Oi oi...isn't that a bit too suspicious already?"
"Is it?"
Accelerator just raised one eyebrow at her and just gave up entirely as he laid back down to get some shut eye.
Ester opened up the envelope that the tickets were supposedly in and to her surprise, there were three(?) passports inside. One of which happened to be Accelerator's while one of it was hers.
"Look! I have your passport here!"
Accelerator merely hummed in response to indicate that he had heard her. However, when he processed the words that she was spitting out of her mouth, he realized something was wrong. He sat up and looked at her, feeling bewildered.
"Let me look at that!"
He got out of the bed with one leg and snatched it from her hands. When he inspected it closely, it was larger than a police identification card, a booklet made of red artificial leather. The words written on it were "Japanese passport".
"What the fuck?!"
Accelerator was at a loss for words. Why the hell was his passport inside? If someone else had won the lottery ticket, wouldn't that mean they would have his passport?
"This is fucking suspicious."
"Oh, and there's also one more."
Ester pulled out one more, and at the front, it said European passport. When Ester opened it to see who it belonged to, she saw the name 'Oriana Thomson' along with the face of the woman who brought pain and suffering to Yumi.
The moment Accelerator heard that name, he knew it had something to do with the magic side.
"Tch, what the fuck is happening here? Are you sure you won this from a lucky draw held by goddamn students?! This is fucking magic we're dealing with here!"
Ester was befuddled by everything that was happening around her. Clearly, whoever gave this to her wanted them to go on a mission, but they had to choose which two can go.
"...Accelerator, I think I'll go with her."
"Ha?! What do you think you can do there?!"
Ester slowly walked towards him as she placed her arm behind his back, almost as if she wanted to give him a hug.
"I can do a lot of things. You'll just have to trust me, just this once."
"But she's not even allowed to leave for 3 weeks! It has only been one week, she'll barely be able to help you."
"It's okay. Just this once...please trust me."
With that, she delivered a hard blow to his spinal nerve, causing him to black out immediately, resting on her stomach with a hard thud.
"This time, I'll protect you." She said as her eyes had a very menacing and sinister feel to it.
-------------------------------------
After getting directions from the doctor, he led her into her ward which was located at the fourth floor.
The only reason Heaven Canceller could allow her to take Oriana Thomson away was because it was manipulated from the higher-ups of Academy City.
To put it simply.
The Chairman of Academy City.
Inside the envelope was one more note directed towards Ester about the mission she was about to embark on.
When she entered Oriana's ward, she was greeted with a mature looking woman with blonde hair similar to hers, only with a darker shade.
"Oh my. What a surprise to see you here. How can Nee-chan help you today?"
Ester simply threw her passport at her and in a harsh voice, told her:
"Come on, we're going to Italy."
"Oh? Am I getting deported now?"
"No, we'll be going on a mission."
"Did the boy sent you here?"
"No, I came on my own accord. Now, get dressed and let's go."
Ester was in a hurry to go there because if the Accelerator were to awaken now, he would certainly not be a happy man.
"Oh my...What's the rush? Still holding a grudge against me?"
Ester clicked her tongue as she glanced at her general direction, fists clenching with rage.
"Nee-chan will get dressed soon, so why don't you wait outside?"
Heaven Canceller and Ester exited the ward, but the doctor pats her shoulders to give her one advice.
"Be careful not to do anything rash. She did not hurt your friend on purpose, I can confirm that."
Ester did not reply him, instead letting him walk away after that.
Even though it took a while, Oriana eventually came out of the ward in a gypsy skirt and a small tube top that covered her chest.
"Now then, mind briefing me on what the mission is?"
"I thought you would run out through the window."
"My my, how cruel of you to think that~, it seems like you've changed quite a lot from the last time we met."
Oriana wasn't scared of her, she was just slightly shocked by the once timid girl she was chased by turning so cruel and cold-hearted.
As they walked out of the hospital, Ester briefed her on the mission at hand.
"We'll be going after a magician called 'Biagio' who is located on the Queen of the Adriatic Sea. I don't know too much about these details because I'm not familiar with the place itself, but the Chairman informed me that you know what it is and what it's origins are."
"Ah, the Queen of the Adriatic Sea. It was built in the 9th century when the remains of one of the Twelve Apostles, St. Mark was brought into Venezia. At that time, Venezia wanted to create a religious environment like how the Vatican protected St. Peter's remains. Knowing this, the Roman Catholic Church created that spell or otherwise what you would know as, a ship."
When they exited the hospital, they flagged for a taxi to the airport at District 23. When they entered the taxi, Oriana continued explaining to Ester what the ship was all about. However, in order not to raise any suspicions, she told her in a quiet voice.
"When Venezia was at its prime, it conquered Padova, Vicenza, Metz, Chioggia, and all the surrounding countries. And at that time, the Venetian government was unable to locate where the Queen of the Adriatic Sea was so they destroyed those suspicious places. That was the reason why they built the Queen of the Adriatic Sea, but during that time they didn't want to use it because they were afraid of the economical losses they would face if they lost that land."
Oriana sat up as she took a deep breath after that long explanation and smiled at her.
"Until they decided to whip it out now. So do you understand everything I just said...uhhhh..."
"Ester. Ester Rosenthal."
"Ah, Ester-chan."
"Don't call address me as 'chan', we are not that well acquainted with each other at the moment."
"Ooooo...scary."
Oriana smirks as Ester gave her a glare from the corner of her eye.
"Whatever you say, Ester-san."
---20th September 4:23p.m.---
When they arrived at District 23, they entered the international airport that had been built for tourists from outside Academy City.
The waiting hall was a bit too spacious; the walls were all made of glass as the sunlight shone upon them from above. Although the news reported that the halls were extremely busy, it only got even more bustling when they went further into the main terminal. Even though people usually carry luggage bags when traveling, Ester was only holding a bag that had whatever she needed to travel.
A knife, a bit of allowance from the Chairman, their passports, a tour guidebook, tickets, cellphone and toothbrushes. They didn't bring any extra clothing as Ester wanted to get the job done quickly.
The Chairman knew everything about her. Also about the fact that she doesn't have any money to spend on her consumables so he knew they would come back soon.
"By the way, Ester-san. Seeing as how unknowledgeable you are about Italy, do you know how to speak Italian?"
"No. That's why I brought you here."
"My~ how kind of you to remove my restraints so that I could come out early."
Ester rolled her eyes as they continued approaching the check-in terminal.
"By the way, Accelerator told me that you needed 3 weeks of rest. How come you're able to move so comfortably now?"
Oriana only glanced at her and she giggled ever so softly.
"Silly. We're both from the magic side, you do know that right? Our dear doctor also knows magic as well and he used it to heal me just yesterday."
"Huh, what a convenient timing."
When they reached the counter, the woman at the counter looked at their passports and compared it to a paper side by side. Whatever was on that paper, must have been like a wanted sign or something as she looked at the two guards standing by the side and nodded at them.
It seems like the Chairman was really ready to put them on this mission. The two guards escorted them through the metal detectors and had them be on their way for the plane flight.
Somewhere deep down in Ester's gut, she knew this was going to be bad.
---21st September 3:09a.m.---
When they arrived at the Marco Polo Airport, or otherwise known as the Gate of Venice. The main purpose of the airport, which was floating above the Adriatic Sea and opposite of the Italian mainland, was to transport tourists. From there, the only way for people to take buses or trains was to walk across the four-kilometer-long Liberia Bridge to the Italian mainland.
Besides the main island Venezia, the roads also lead to Vicenza, Padua, Bassano del Grappa, Belluno, and other cities. The main point was that it was just a center ground for tourists to travel almost anywhere in Italy and to explore it as a country and that was where their tour group was supposed to be.
However, after seeing how they were treated, Ester doubted that any tour group would be waiting for them at this point.
It was 3 a.m. at night, no one would be around the area.
The coasts of Venice were made of stone canals, letting the rivers flow into the sea like a saw cutting the land. The buildings were packed together so there were small gaps between the houses. The turquoise waters separated the town like lines, which was about 20 to 30 meters wide, there were flat roads on both sides, and suddenly blocked in front of a house. The rice-white surface of the wall looked like the first layer of a dike.
But they didn't come here to take a history class, they came here to defeat a magician, and so Ester told Oriana to lead the way. However...there was one main problem.
"Sorry Ester-san but I don't know where the Queen of the Adriatic Sea is located. It very well may have taken off right about now."
"Nonsense. If the Chairman was very particular about who I choose my partners, surely he would have accounted for the fact that we don't know this place as well. We're already at the destination where the ship could be anywhere. We just have to keep our eyes peeled."
Before Ester could make a decision, she heard a swift motion blowing through the air directly behind her and without even reacting to it, she swung her left arm back, guarding the side of her face.
The loud sound of flesh colliding could be heard through the night.
"Ho ho...seems like you were well trained, Ester-chan~"
"Tch, what's the meaning of this?"
Oriana had her leg up in the air just from trying to kick Ester in the head.
"I was just seeing if this little girl who was leading me into this journey knew what she was doing. And my oh my, is she well-versed in close combat."
Ester pushed her leg back as she went in to deliver a hard lower jab right at her abdomen but the taller lady blocked it by parrying with her forearm.
"Come to think of it, I never got a chance to fight you. And there can only be one secretary standing beside Accelerator-kun."
"That will obviously not be you!"
Ester swept Oriana's left foot off the ground and Oriana fell to the ground immediately. However, it was intentional.
She did a low sweep from the ground, knocking Ester's feet to the ground. However, she did a front flip to get behind Oriana. From that angle, Ester tried to stomp on Oriana, but the European was much faster as she dodged it and quickly got back on her feet.
"Heh, if we were fighting with magic, the results would be much different. Unfortunately, we shouldn't be causing this much ruckus late at night."
Ester continued her assault on her starting with a left kick that shook Oriana only a little, however she took that opportunity to swing her right leg at full force as she changed legs and Oriana barely managed to stand strong.
Using that opportunity, Ester swung with her right fist and Oriana was forced to block with her forearm yet again.
Ester's punches was something she had not experienced before. Even fully grown men could not put out the same amount of force that she had while maintaining control over her movements.
She was indeed a formidable foe for her.
Oriana tried going on the defensive by attacking her legs with a lower kick but Ester dug down and grabbed her leg as she tried to twist her leg, however, Oriana countered by spinning her body so that her other leg connected with Ester's face.
Another loud thud came before Oriana stood on the ground yet again and charged at her with a strike to her stomach, followed by an elbow to the side of her head. Ester tanked those attacks as she balled her right hand up to deliver a devastating right uppercut to Oriana's jaw before connecting it with another punch with her left hand.
"Ester-chan, you are really good. I almost came just from those punches. However, warm up is over."
Oriana cracked her neck as she faced Ester once more.
"The real fight starts now!"
Oriana rushed her, starting with a simple right punch but Ester simply caught it and delivered a knee to Oriana's stomach. However, Oriana was prepared for it as she used her free hand to guard against the attack. Out of nowhere, Ester managed to lift herself up to deliver a hard knee to the side of her head and she was knocked sideways.
Oriana stumbled on her feet, but she simply shrugged it off while smiling.
Ester was flexible, fast and hard hitting. She was the perfect fighter.
Ester and Oriana rushed towards each other both about to throw an adjacent punch to each other but they both blocked it simultaneously. They both then threw a headbutt at each other, knocking each of their heads back and then, as if great minds thought alike, they both threw a kick at each other's stomachs.
They both lost their grip as they stumbled on their feet once more.
They were not tired at all. The thing was, it seemed like they had drawn the attention of a few unwanted visitors from the Roman Catholic Church. So Oriana signaled it to Ester by giving her a wink.
At first, Ester looked confused but when they rushed at each other once again, Oriana forced a headbutt on the both of them and whispered," They're here, so fall and play along."
Having understood the situation, Ester nodded as Oriana delivered a hard knee to Ester's stomach and Ester faked a fatal injury, panting heavily as she dropped to one knee.
"Ha...ha...ha...damn you, Oriana!!"
"Heh, lights out."
Oriana threw a side kick that landed to the side of Ester's head and she immediately fell to the ground.
Oriana took a deep sigh of relief as she patted herself of all the dust that she accumulated in that fight before shouting.
"I am Oriana Thomson, former member of the Roman Catholic Church, serving under Sister Lidvia. I have come to seek redemption from the church as I offer this human sacrifice who has specifically came for the Queen of the Adriatic Sea!"
Men dressed in pitch black priest robes slowly showed themselves above the houses around them and some even came up from underwater.
All of them had a single weapon, while some were unarmed, presumably snipers from Oriana's guess. Those who had a weapon held it to her neck, a single spear. So it was like she was a caged animal being held back by a collar and leash.
With her at the center of the group, she could not go anywhere, but the good thing was that the attention was all on her.
"My, this is the first time Nee-chan has been the center of attention."
The men in black priest robes didn't care about her expression. Their only goal was to bring her back to Biagio to repent for her sins.
However, that was the cue for Ester to attack. In a swift motion, with her head still down, she swept the man in front of her off his feet, grabbed his spear and immediately hit the person beside him with the back of his spear, incapacitating him.
Oriana moved as well as she took her flashcards out from the center of her chest and bit on one of them. She placed it on the person behind her who was ready to impale the back of her neck and he suffered serious blood loss.
His veins started to pop all over his body and blood slowly dripped down his body.
For the person beside her, she held his spear and poked the back of it into his navel and followed it up with a kick to the side of his head, knocking him out.
As for the snipers, there were 3 of them. They tried to get away, but Ester took out her kitchen knife and threw it at one of them, hitting him in the back. As for the other two, Ester took one of the spears from the ground and lunged it at one of them while Oriana used one of her flashcard to burn the last person however, it was not to the extent that it would kill him or give him third-degree burns.
"Wow, are we going to kill now?"
Ester looked back at her in a frightening manner, as she snarled, "It was only a simple throw, I had not expected his body not to survive that."
The one that she threw a spear at was bleeding out from the center of his chest as he looked at the both of them.
"You will...not...get out of this...without punishment!!!"
He spat his last breaths out as he finally fell to the ground.
For the first time in her life, Ester had actually killed someone.
She pulled her knife out of the other one and cleaned it with his black robes so that she did not dirty her outfit with blood.
The person who Ester downed first was going to be the unfortunate one to lead them to the ship. He tried to scurry away, but it was too late. Ester pulled his leg back and placed her knife on his throat. She had a very cold expression that did not match with her light green eyes.
"You will bring us aboard that ship. Otherwise we'll hang every single one of you with your robes and put you up on display for the whole of Venice to see."
The man shuddered as he slowly nodded his head, ensuring his throat did not get sliced in the process.
Oriana had a very worrisome look on her face as this girl was not the girl she had met during the Daihasei Festival.
This was someone else.
"Ester-san, don't you think this is pushing it?"
"The weapon they are about to use is also pushing it, don't you think Oriana-san?"
"..."
Oriana had nothing to say seeing as how she was making a fair point. However, this was not the world Accelerator promised.
"What you're doing is wrong!"
"Hm?"
Ester looked puzzled for a second but she nonchalantly answers.
"Why are you saying it like I didn't know that?"
"Gh?!" Oriana flinched at her answer, no way any human can just do what she was doing and admit to it.
"Oh yeah, and if you tell Accelerator about any of this..."
Ester said in a low but scary voice," I'll kill you."
With that, Ester pointed the spear at the back of the poor priest as he slowly walked forwards towards the Chioggia area where the man stopped at a certain point beside the canal and looked at the two girls.
"I...I have to jump inside the water to activate the ship."
Ester pushed the tip of the spear closer to his neck as she questions him once more.
"Will Biagio be there?"
"Yes yes!! But not in this ship!! He's in the flagship!!"
Ester looked confused as she glanced at Oriana.
"Hey, don't look at me. I only thought they built one ship. I didn't expect them to have one more."
"Umm...it's not just one more. It's a whole fleet of ships."
Ester and Oriana were both shocked to hear that and they both knew it was not going to be an easy task to clear out a whole fleet of ships.
"Go and activate the ship now. If you try to run away or whatever, I will kill you when I find you."
"Urrk!? Okay, okay!!"
He jumped into the water while walking around and not a minute later, the ground started to rumble as something made of ice slowly started to appear out of the small canal. Oriana and Ester both jumped in at the same time and as the ice statue slowly rose out of the water, they realized the surface wasn't as slippery as they thought it would be. The ship had 4 masts and the ship was so wide that it destroyed bits of the canal which was around 30 meters wide and when the ship fully emerged, it was estimated to be around 20 meters high with the triangular masts being around 40 meters in height.
Needless to say, it was a very big ship. The length in itself was over 100 meters, and from the deck which were where they were, it was coinciding with the cabins. When the ship jerked, they knew it was starting to move. Immediately, footsteps could be heard tapping below them. It sounded as if 20-40 people were on the ship.
When Oriana and Ester looked around for their victim, they realized he had already ran away.
"Tch, damn it!!"
Ester bit her fingernail as she thought about what they should do next. Fight or hide?
"As strong as we are, if we fought 20 magicians right now, we're going to get shot from the back one way or another. When they've left their cabins, we sneak in and take shelter for now."
"Yes ma'am."
Oriana and Ester moved down from the captain's deck and went to hide behind a bunch of boxes that the nuns had lying around there.
When the nuns came out, that one priest in black robe was ordering them around.
"Find the two intruders and bring them to me! I want them alive."
He had a bit of distastefulness in his voice, maybe due to the fact he was held at knifepoint and treated like a dog.
And so they waited.
---21st September 8:47a.m.---
In the past few days since he had returned from his vacation trip, Accelerator didn't have his black coffee craving satisfied. And so, like any normal person, he went to get some. At first he planned on getting the one inside the vending machine inside and around the hospital but to his dismay, none of them had his black coffee.
So he went looking outside the hospital. He had to use his battery power to jump around and look for the vending machine that had black coffee inside and after jumping around like a monkey for the past few minutes, he finally found one vending machine that actually had black coffee but it was from a different brand.
"(Whatever, black coffee should taste the same no matter what company made them.)"
Accelerator had a very joyful look on his face as he slowly inserted the coins inside the machine and when all the coins were inserted into the machine, he was about to press his desired drink until a train came running at him.
"EHHHHHH?!?!?!?"
A loud thud was then heard and the girl who was running at him was sent flying forwards while Accelerator was pushed even further than her. Due to his light weight, along with him not being able to turn his battery on in time, he was inevitably knocked straight out.
---18th September 9:01a.m.---
"Ahhh...I'm gonna be late for class!!"
"I told you this was all your fault for distracting me!! Oh no...I can't leave this boy here in this state."
Accelerator heard a single voice around him, although he was starting to gain consciousness, he felt his chest beating hard. Actually it was beating harder than it was supposed to. That was actually due to the fact that the girl was performing CPR on him.
So every push into his chest felt like a hammer slamming deep into his heart and he sat up immediately, looking at who the culprit of that assault was.
Sitting beside him was a middle-school girl with a slender body frame and a small bust size with lavender hair ending with ringlet curls along with purple eyes that complemented the color of her hair. However, the one thing that stood out from her was not her appearance but the uniform of the school she was attending.
Tokiwadai Middle School.
"Ah! You're awake, thank goodness! Are you okay? Do you feel any pain anywhere in your body?"
The moment he saw the crest and name of the school she was attending, he instinctively knew she was bad news.
So what did he do when she asked him that question? He immediately without a single hesitation in the world, breaking the world record for the fastest answer ever known to mankind, he even politely said...
"No. Thank you, I'm fine. Now just leave me alone."
He quickly grabbed his cane in record time and slowly limped back to the vending machine. However, the girl persisted.
"Are...are you sure? I'm sure I hit you pretty hard just now, sorry!!"
"No, it's okay. I'm fine."
"Are you sure? You don't look very good to me."
In reality, Accelerator did not feel good. It was to the point where it looked like he was walking in a straight line, but to her he was walking left and right. And when he almost fell to one knee, she popped up behind him and lifted him up.
"Umm...do you want me to send you to the hospital? I can bring you there."
"No, it's okay...I can...walk there myself..."
Accelerator, with her support on the side which didn't have the cane, went all the way to the vending machine just to find the black coffee all gone.
"Fuck!! Goddamn it!!"
He slammed his cane on the vending machine like any other old man would, and Hokaze immediately felt uneasy.
"He's not weird. And don't call others that!!"
Even though she whispered to whoever was beside her, Accelerator could hear it and he turned to her just to find no one.
"You have the audacity to say that, even though you're talking to the air..."
The girl was shocked when he said that. It seemed like she had been misinterpreted.
"What are you? Talking to a ghost? Heh."
Accelerator smirked as he looked at her but her face had a very uncomfortable look. Either she was embarrassed, or he was actually telling the truth. And when he realized that, he didn't want to know the answer to that as well. So he chose to continue to walk back to the hospital.
"I guess this will be the first and last time we meet."
"Wait!!"
Accelerator didn't stop walking.
"D-Do you know anything about ghosts Academy City?"
"Dunno, don't care."
"Wait!! Do you need help to walk back from wherever you came from?"
This time, Accelerator's reception to her was bad as he turned around and shouted at her.
"NO! I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING AND I DON'T CARE ABOUT GHOSTS IN ACADEMY CITY SO BEAT IT."
Accelerator didn't want anything to do with Tokiwadai girls as so far, all his experience with them has either led to a bad ending or an awkward relationship.
"Errr...I'm sorry..."
She looked down as a feeling of guilt overwhelmed her. She had just made annoyed an old man and even knocked him to the ground, causing him to feel shaky.
Accelerator on the other hand didn't care about how she felt. He just wanted a way out of this situation and guessed that worked out for him. However, he felt a sudden force within his body.
"Wait, no!"
The lavender haired girl shouted behind him, but he couldn't even turn his back to face her. He didn't know what was happening, but his vision was slowly blurring in and out.
"Agh!? What the fuck is this?!"
He touched his chest area with his Imagine Breaker, but nothing happened. He was still fading in and out of existence.
The lavender haired girl stood behind him as she tried to shake something out of him, but it was just making him even more dizzier.
However, alas whatever was haunting finally came out as what seemed like white steam coming out of his chest at first slowly accumulated into a small girl.
"...Ha?"
Accelerator could not believe what he was seeing. It seemed like everyday was just getting weird for him. First it was facing off Kamijou Touma, next was encountering magic, next was getting mixed up with a bunch of nuns, next was finding a girl who could use magic but was involved in the science side, and now it was ghosts. Needless to say, he had a very tiring one month.
"Rrrrrghhh...his body was so stubborn!! He wouldn't let me go to his brain, and I couldn't even control his body, and..."
The ghost girl paused as Accelerator and her made eye contact for the first time and they both gave each other a questionable look.
"Is he looking at me? Junko-chan, I think he's looking at me! Oh my god!! What do I do!?!?!?"
Accelerator then looked at the lavender haired girl who was supposedly 'Junko-chan' and she only tried to lighten up the situation by laughing a bit.
"Ummm...my friend didn't mean to do anything wrong!"
"No! I meant to do something wrong because he was treating Junko-chan like trash! And so I had to teach him a lesson!"
Accelerator's thoughts only started to run when he saw the ghost.
"(Is this magic? Or is this an esper ability? God, they can both do the fucking exact same shit, I don't even fucking know anymore!!!)"
Junko bowed down to Accelerator with her head very low as she apologized to him.
"I'm sorry about this!! I'm so sorry about this, mister!! Actually, I don't know who this person is as well! But she just suddenly came around and started haunting me!!"
Accelerator still had not said a single word since she popped out of his body. However, his instinct was kicking in as he slowly limped towards the ghost girl.
He reached his left hand out to touch her, but she quickly backed up behind Junko.
"Ewwww!! This boy is trying to touch me, Junko-chan~ Save me!!"
"Eheheh, please don't take her too seriously, she's just a...wait, are you a student in Academy City?"
The sudden realization hit Junko. The ghost girl had mentioned something about him being a BOY, but not an OLD MAN. However, Accelerator did not mind as it was not his first time being mistaken as an old man because of his cane and hair. And he finally said something.
"Tch, I'm not an old man, but I'm also not a student. I've already graduated and now I'm just a delinquent roaming around Academy City."
"Oh...wait, a delinquent?"
"Ha...whatever. Let me just try something real quick."
Accelerator slowly limped towards the ghost girl yet again, but she backed up even more.
"Ahhhh!!! Help me, Junko-chan!! Don't let this pervert touch me!!"
Hearing that, Junko quickly held his left hand and asked in a nice way," ummm sorry to ask but what are you trying to do?"
Accelerator stopped for a moment and then decided against it. His curiosity was peaked because it was a ghost girl that no one could see with their naked eyes. Only when she entered his body and left was the moment he could see her. So...
What kind of ability or magic is that?
"Nothing."
Just as his hand was released, his head started throbbing so much that he actually got a headache and mixed in with the dizziness, he could not support himself any longer as he fell forward.
Into Junko's chest which was just below average size. Junko didn't manage to catch him, and so it was as if she had hugged his face closer to her chest.
And the ghost behind her started panicking.
"Oh no!! Junko-chan's purity has been tainted!! This boy has to pay for what he's done!!"
She tried to fly inside his body but she was immediately rejected. She could not enter like she could just now.
Something was stopping her this time.
"Stop. We should get him to the hospital asap."
Junko said as her eyebrows burrowed themselves.
And with that, it was the start of Accelerator's ghost hunting adventure.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
dontouchme
dontouchme Hello author here with another chapter. Yeah, I know right. So quick. But this is the buildup to everyone's favourite date 30/09. Hope my former readers have came back, but don't expect too much. I'm just back for a short while, who knows when I'll disappear again. Thank you for reading this chapter, please do read Astral Buddy to have a better understanding on whats about to happen from here on out! And also, Ester becomes the Accelerator?!!?!??!