Innocence Seekers: April Light/Chapter 3/Episode 27

This is the third episode, "Palace Battle" (宮殿の戦い), of the third chapter of Innocence Seekers: April Light.

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Episode text
Uzuki and Tamaki arrived at the Miyana house in Yaezora.

–Uzuki: It has been a while, but I'm finally back.

–Tamaki: I've been thinking, who has been looking after the house while it was unoccupied? I mean, Yayoi currently lives with Misato and Michiru.

–Uzuki: Akacchi's mother is supposed to be looking after it. Although lately Mi-chan has also been using the house.

–Tamaki: I see. Anyway, should we head inside?

–Uzuki: We should. Let's head inside.

The two girls entered the house. Mirai was waiting inside.

–Uzuki: Ah, Mi-chan!

–Mirai: Welcome back, Uzuki. It must feel nice to be back home.

–Uzuki: Ah, it is. Anyway, Yayoi-nee called us here, so...

–Mirai: I already know. In fact, that's why I'm here.

–Tamaki: So, what's going on?

–Mirai: Together with Kotone, I investigated the World Orbs, their properties, and their origins. The World Orbs originated with the Donsilans, and they were originally designed to be terraforming devices. They were designed to process huge amounts of mana and information, in order to shape the entire planet's environment. In the book I looked into, it said that a single World Orb is capable of processing around 50 petabytes of information at once with as many as a million execution units, and is capable of storing a thousand times that much.

–Uzuki: Wait... I don't quite understand.

–Tamaki: In other words, they're quite like our own magic devices, right?

–Mirai: Pretty much.

–Tamaki: Although that's where the similarities end. For starters, those World Orbs must be even more powerful than humanity's most powerful supercomputers.

–Mirai: However, that's not all. You know how the World Orbs are keeping that being in the Cave of Illusions sealed, right?

–Uzuki: Ah, yes, we know.

–Mirai: That is because the World Orbs were repurposed. The Donsilans realised that magic alone was not enough to defeat that being, and that they did not have the power to kill it. So they found a way to imbue Innocence into the World Orbs, in order to create a seal within the Cave of Illusions.

–Tamaki: But how? Innocence and magic are supposed to be incompatible with each other, and only magical girls can use both.

–Mirai: This was done... by sacrificing hundreds, if not thousands, of magical girls. By pooling their Innocence and imbuing their essences into the World Orbs, they gave the orbs the ability to utilise both Innocence and magic.

–Uzuki: That's horrible...

–Tamaki: Why was such a thing even necessary? The Donsilans are supposed to be the most advanced society in the galaxy.

–Mirai: I have no idea myself. I have to admit, I was shocked myself that they had resorted to this in an attempt, if not to save their civilisation, then to at least preserve the galaxy for any life in it.

–Uzuki: Anyway... where is Yayoi-nee?

–Mirai: She should be returning soon.

–Uzuki: Ah, okay.

–Tamaki: Mirai, I've been thinking, why are you constantly moving between Japan and Namari? If you wanted something done in Japan, you could have just asked Sakura.

–Mirai: I could have done that, but the requests specifically called for me to come, and besides, Sakura was suffering from mana poisoning at the time. By the way, she's actually here in Yaezora right now.

–Tamaki: Wait, since when?

–Mirai: Since around last night. If you're wondering, she's currently meeting with the queen.

–Uzuki: Ah, so when is Sa-chan coming back here?

–Mirai: I'm not sure; she'll come back when she can. Anyway...

–?????: I'm back!

The three girls turned towards the front door. It was Yayoi and Michiru.

–Mirai: Ah, welcome back, Yayoi.

–Uzuki: Yayoi-nee!

Uzuki ran up to Yayoi and embraced her.

–Yayoi: Welcome home, Uzuki.

–Mirai: Ah, Michiru, what are you doing here?

–Michiru: Oh, I just wanted to see Uzuki again.

–Tamaki: You know, we met in Sicily only a few weeks ago.

–Michiru: Back then, we were kind of in a hurry.

–Uzuki: Chiru-chan, can I ask you something?

–Michiru: What is it, Uzuki?

–Uzuki: Do you have any connection to any of the four lineages of the Namari royal family?

–Michiru: To be honest, I don't know. Neither does my sister.

–Yayoi: Well, I'm sure you'll find out soon enough.

–Uzuki: What about you, Mirai?

–Mirai: Me? Well Sakura outright told me that Yayoi and I share a great-great- great-great-grandmother. And since there are no intervening males between her and me, then that should make me part of your lineage.

–Tamaki: So you're fifth cousins? I never knew that.

–Yayoi: Well, it's not like anyone bothers to know that kind of stuff. Anyway, Tama-chan, I have something to tell you.

–Tamaki: What is it, Yayoi?

–Yayoi: You are also part of our lineage.

There was a moment of silence.

–Tamaki: Eh?!

–Mirai: It was a shock to me as well. But anyway, on to why we called you here.

–Yayoi: You know how in Puella's headquarters in Iceland there was a chamber where the fifth World Orb is?

–Uzuki: Ah, yes. And we were told to bring the other World Orbs there.

–Yayoi: That's right. While we were doing our own investigation on the World Orbs here, we found the exact same chamber located deep within the Namari Royal Palace. Unfortunately, it is sealed off with four extremely powerful seals, that can only be opened by four members of each respective lineage.

–Tamaki: Four members... well we have the required number of people from the Miyana lineage, what about the others?

–Uzuki: I know Benio is part of the Kuritani lineage, but will there be enough for all of them? Who will be unsealing the chamber?

–Mirai: If I recall, from the Kuritani lineage, Akari will be accompanied by Kaede.

–Uzuki: Wait, is Kaede a part of the Kuritani lineage as well?

–Tamaki: Apparently so. And from what I've heard, Aoi may be related to Kaede as well.

–Mirai: Anyway, from the Akagawa lineage, Inori and Wakaba are on their way here. I know Hiyori is also a part of the Akagawa lineage, but who could the fourth person be?

–Yayoi: That's something I'm trying to find out as well. But we won't know at least until Inorin gets here.

–Michiru: For the Umehara line... we've got the queen and her sister, and Sakura... and who else?

–Mirai: I believe it's Aika-senpai. I heard she arrived here a while ago.

–Uzuki: Wait, Ai-chan? She's here?

–Mirai: Yes.

–Uzuki: I was wondering where she went.

–Yayoi: Anyway, let's head to the royal palace.

–Uzuki: Okay.

The five girls left the house and headed to the royal palace.

–Uzuki: Yayoi-nee, do you have any idea where the air-elemental World Orb could be?

–Yayoi: Not much. Mum told me that the green orb was located somewhere where there is snow on the ground for the entirety of winter.

–Uzuki: I was told that it bordered the sea, Namari and Blyland. Unfortunately that description was probably more accurate a thousand years ago.

–Yayoi: And it'll be a lot of effort to search the entirety of the northern coastline. However, the current border between Blyland and Namari is right between East and West Pimbia, rather than on the western side of West Pimbia as it was a thousand years ago.

–Mirai: Then that means we've pretty much located the general area of the World Orb.

–Uzuki: You mean West Pimbia? I better tell Melody that.

–Yayoi: Anyway, the queen is waiting for us. Let's go.

When the girls reached the royal palace, they found the gate open.

–Yayoi: Wait... what is going on? Where are the guards?

–Mirai: Let's check it out.

The girls walked to the gate, where they found four of the royal guards lying on the ground in a pool of blood. Three of them were already dead, while Yayoi noticed that one was still alive, but barely clinging on to life. She approached the mortally-wounded guard.

–Yayoi: What happened here?

–Guard: Yayoi-sama... is that you...? Listen... this woman, this mage... she, she... she's after the royal palace's... World Orb.... Please... stop her... the queen... the princess... they're... in danger...

The guard lost consciousness.

–Yayoi: Did everyone get that?

–Michiru: Yes.

–Tamaki: This is serious. Judging by the mana signature from within the palace, this mage must be extremely powerful. We must be very careful from here on.

–Uzuki: Right.

–Yayoi: Anyway, let's go.

The girls ran into the palace, where they found more bodies.

–Mirai: The guards never stood a chance...

–Yayoi: Well, we better prepare for battle. Who knows where the enemy is.

The girls changed into their mage outfits.

–Tamaki: I sense her. She's heading straight to the throne room.

–Yayoi: Let's hurry!

The girls ran to the throne room, where they saw more bodies.

–Michiru: It seems that the queen has fled.

–Tamaki: However...

Tamaki turned around and saw a strange woman.

–Tamaki: Wait... you're that admiral from before...

–Alcea: Indeed I am. Let be introduce myself. I am Alcea, the most powerful mage the Donsilans have produced in recent history. My coming shall be the end of your pitiful race, humans!

–Yayoi: Not if I can help it!

Yayoi took out her bow and shot an arrow towards Alcea. However, the arrow had no effect.

–Alcea: Did you think attacks like that would work against me? I will now show you the gulf between your power and mine.

Alcea began to cast a spell, and large blue magic circles surrounded the girls. In response, Mirai began to cast her own spell. A large magic circle appeared behind her.

–Alcea: Useless.

The magic circles surrounding the girls shot a massive barrage of magic bullets. The girls put up barriers in response.

–Mirai: You may be powerful, but...

The barriers shattered; however, right at the last moment, the surrounding space began to warp, causing the magic bullets to dissipate.

–Alcea: What's going on?! Who's there?!

–Yayoi: Wait... Orialla?

The witch responsible began to communicate telepathically.

–Orialla: &lt;Yes, it's me. But I didn't think you would end up fighting a powerful Donsilan.&gt;

–Yayoi: But how did you get here in the first place? I thought you were in Haguya.

–Orialla: &lt;I noticed that Mirai was trying to summon something, so I decided to hijack her spell.&gt;

–Mirai: You know, that could've gone horribly wrong.

–Tamaki: Mirai, what were you trying to summon, anyway?

–Mirai: A golem; my dragon wouldn't fit in the palace.

The surrounding space settled, revealing a vast plain.

–Orialla: &lt;Alcea, was it? Well, welcome to my witch space. I hope you enjoy your stay, as you won't be leaving very easily.&gt;

–Alcea: You think you can restrain me? You clearly do not know what you are up against.

Alcea drew her sword and, with one almightly slash, tore a hole in the witch space. However, the hole almost immediately closed.

–Orialla: &lt;It won't be that simple. But maybe I should appear before you.&gt;

A green magic circle appeared between the girls and Alcea. From it emerged Orialla.

–Orialla: So, shall we begin?

Alcea charged straight towards Orialla, who leapt into the air to avoid the attack.

–Orialla: Too slow!

Orialla sent green magic spears towards Alcea, who put up a barrier to protect herself.

–Alcea: You aren't going to be able to harm me with those weak spells.

Suddenly, a large blue magic circle appeared behind Mirai. From it emerged her dragon.

–Alcea: A dragon?

The dragon swooped on Alcea, striking her with its talons, causing her to stagger backwards.

–Alcea: Where did you find this dragon, girl?

–Mirai: On Haralni, three years ago. I was surprised, since I thought they were extinct.

–Alcea: I thought they were extinct as well. No matter. Even if the Donsilans haven't fought them for two million years, I will defeat it.

Alcea attacked the dragon with her sword, but the dragon caught the blade.

–Mirai: I wouldn't underestimate her.

Suddenly, the dragon breathed fire on Alcea, forcing her to jump back to evade the attack. Meanwhile, Michiru was preparing a massive spell. Several massive ice spears appeared in front of her.

–Michiru: Let's see if you can take this.

Michiru threw the ice spears straight towards Alcea. However, they had no effect. Suddenly, a massive bolt of lightning struck Alcea.

–Yayoi: Did that do anything? It seems that whatever we throw at her, she will take without so much as a scratch.

–Alcea: You are correct. There is a huge difference in power between you and me. Allow me to demonstrate.

Suddenly, Alcea sent a massive blue magic beam straight towards Uzuki.

–Tamaki: Uzuki!

A white glow began to envelop Uzuki, causing the beam to dissipate before it could reach her.

–Yayoi: Wait... what is going on?

–Tamaki: Uzuki...

–Alcea: How... how were you able to withstand my attack?!

Uzuki did not respond.

–Mirai: Innocence.

–Alcea: Innocence?

–Mirai: The essence of a pure-hearted child. Surely you already know.

–Alcea: Tch. I'll just overcome this "Innocence".

–Tamaki: It doesn't work that way, Alcea.

Tamaki took out her Innocence Shard. It was glowing.

–Tamaki: Magic and Innocence are inherently incompatible. Only magical girls have the ability to use both at the same time. To any spell not cast by a magical girl, Innocence is effectively a powerful anti-magic field. And once an Innocence Shard is activated, or a magical girl begins to possess that white glow, whoever has those things becomes outright immune to magic.

–Alcea: Then I just have to strike you down with my blade!

Alcea charged straight towards Tamaki and attempted to attack her. However, Tamaki stepped to one side, took out a rocket launcher from her bag, and fired it at point blank range, with the resulting explosion sending both combatants flying backwards.

–Tamaki: However, magical girls can still use magic even when enveloped by active Innocence. So I didn't need to dodge your attack; your sword might as well have been a dull, rusty stick to me.

–Alcea: Even so, can you get through my defences?

–Tamaki: We can try.

Tamaki took a sword from her bag. She held it out, and began to focus. A massive pink magic circle appeared beneath her feet.

–Tamaki: Bloom, my flower.

With a massive burst of pink light, Tamaki entered Full Burst mode. Eight drones surrounded her, and the blade of her sword had turned into a pink mana blade.

–Alcea: Useless.

Alcea charged at Tamaki, with her sword enveloped in a blue glow. However, the glow dissipated the moment it approached Tamaki.

–Tamaki: You're forgetting the "immune to magic" bit. Even your ability to knock mages out of Full Burst mode is useless against Innocence.

Meanwhile, a massive yellow magic circle appeared beneath Uzuki's feet.

–Uzuki: Bloom, my flower.

Uzuki entered Full Burst mode.

–Uzuki: I won't allow you to harm humanity. I won't allow you to bring destruction to the galaxy. Your kind have been absent for a long time; what makes you think that you can just come in and destroy all that we've built?

Uzuki attacked Alcea with her sword.

–Alcea: They say you're able to destroy spaceships. But can you defeat me?

Alcea counterattacked; however, the attack had no effect. Uzuki proceeded to attack Alcea again, launching several strikes per second, forcing Alcea on to the defensive.

–Uzuki: Alcea. Evil must be destroyed. If you insist on performing evil deeds, then I have no choice but to kill you.

Uzuki's sword became electrified. With one mighty swing, she struck Alcea. The amount of energy in the attack was enough to cause an explosion, sending both combatants flying backward.

–Yayoi: What... Uzuki, what is going on with you?

–Mirai: Yayoi, that can happen with Innocence. It's almost as if she is possessed by a god.

–Yayoi: Anyway, let's leave it to them. By the way, is it just me or are all of our spells weaker than usual?

–Mirai: I noticed as well. Michiru, what do you think?

–Michiru: I know why, but I won't mention it right now. All I can say is that it isn't the Donsilan.

Meanwhile, Tamaki's drones fired a barrage of magic bullets at Alcea, who put up a barrier in response. However, the barrier began to crack.

–Alcea: What?

Tamaki attacked the barrier with her sword, shattering it. Alcea tried to counter, but Tamaki's blade effortlessly stripped Alcea's blade from its hilt. The blade ended up flying to around 20 metres to the side of the combatants.

–Orialla: Yayoi, did she just...

–Yayoi: Yes, you really did see that. Tama-chan's Full Burst mode leverages literally every possible magic effect, in order to give her the best chance of winning. Despite her generally weak mana output compared even to me, her clever use of magic effects allows her to fight just about anything. That is what makes it one of the most powerful Full Burst modes any mage can have.

–Orialla: But how can she determine which magic effects to activate?

–Yayoi: That is where her Inherent Ability, Perfect Learning, comes in. It allows her to literally master anything in a matter of hours, if not minutes. It allowed Hiyorin and her mother to design a magic device for Tama-chan without regard to UI complexity. If anyone else tried to use such a device, he or she would be lost.

The drones disappeared and Tamaki's blade reverted back to a solid form.

–Yayoi: But that Full Burst mode is really taxing on Tama-chan's limited mana pool.

–Tamaki: Uzuki, she's all yours.

–Uzuki: Everyone, clear the area.

Tamaki and the others retreated, leaving Uzuki with Alcea. Uzuki began to cast a massive spell, and a massive yellow magic circle appeared beneath her feet.

–Orialla: Here come the storm clouds...

–Mirai: Everyone! Barriers!

–Michiru: Right.

The girls put up barriers.

–Alcea: You think you'll be able to hit me with that spell? By the time you cast it, I'll already be a long way away.

Alcea tried to flee; however, orange ribbons appeared out of nowhere and wrapped themselves around Alcea, restraining her.

–Alcea: W-Who's there?!

A girl's voice called out to Uzuki.

–Voice: Now's your chance, Uzuki!

Uzuki closed her eyes and began to focus. After a while, a massive bolt of lightning emerged from the storm clouds above and struck Alcea. The amount of energy in the bolt was so large it caused a massive explosion, straining the barriers already put up. Once the dust had settled, Alcea was nowhere to be seen. The white glow enveloping Uzuki disappeared.

–Uzuki: Huh? What... happened to me? What was going on?

Tamaki approached Uzuki.

–Tamaki: Ah, you're back to normal, Uzuki. Well, we were fighting that Donsilan. We won... I think.

–Uzuki: Come to think of it, where is that Donsilan? We were fighting her, as you said, but what happened to her?

The rest of the girls approached Uzuki.

–Michiru: I sensed it. She used a mana crystal to teleport herself to another planet. I don't think she'll bother us for a while.

–Mirai: What I'm wondering is, who was that who helped us?

–Michiru: I know who it is.

Michiru turned to a particular direction.

–Michiru: Kaede! You can come out now!

Kaede emerged from the debris in the distance and approached the group.

–Yayoi: Wait, Kaede, what are you doing here?

–Kaede: Well, I came here with Akari, but I saw bodies. Lots of bodies. I figured that whatever was inside Orialla's witch space was responsible so I entered and saw you fighting that Donsilan.

–Orialla: So that explains those orange binds. But how were you able to create binds powerful enough to restrain Alcea?

–Kaede: My Inherent Ability, of course.

–Tamaki: Ah, right. If I recall, you and Aoi have similar Inherent Abilities, right?

–Kaede: That's right. I absorbed all that mana while in Full Burst mode, and used it to create a powerful binding spell. But, I've been wondering, what was going on with Uzuki? It was as if she was an entirely different person.

–Uzuki: That's what I want to know as well!

–Tamaki: Well, it has to do with the Innocence within you, Uzuki. I don't know the details, but certain magical girls have the ability to call upon a divine force for assistance, usually associated with Innocence.

–Kaede: Anyway, shouldn't we be leaving this witch space? Akari and the others are waiting.

–Orialla: Ah, right.

Orialla closed her eyes. The space around the group warped, and the group found themselves back in the throne room.

End of Episode 27

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Commentary
In this episode, Mirai gives a rough outline on the specifications of the World Orbs. As mentioned, they resemble the magic devices used by mages in the modern era; however, the World Orbs are far more powerful. A World Orb consists of 917,504 vector processing units, 65,536 tensor processing units, 32,768 general-purpose processing units and 131,072 general floating-point processing units for a total of 1,146,880 execution units (in comparison, a high-end gaming PC would only have somewhere between 3000 and 8000 execution units, most coming from the GPU(s)). Mirai says that it can process 50 petabytes of information; however, the World Orb itself has 64 pebibytes (or just over 72 petabytes) of memory, half of which are assigned to the general-purpose and general floating point units, and the rest to the vector and tensor processing units (in comparison, most desktop platforms only support up to 64 gibibytes, or 68.7 gigabytes, of system memory, with Skylake-X and Ryzen Threadripper HEDT platforms supporting double the memory, and the GeForce GTX 1080 Ti, the most powerful gaming GPU as of writing, has only 11 gibibytes, or 11.8 gigabytes, of video memory).

Each World Orb possesses 50 exabytes of secondary storage, which is far higher than any individual device invented as of writing. The nature of this storage is solid-state, using novel technology I won't explain here (the Donsilans abandoned magnetic storage media a very long time ago). The general-purpose processing units handle 64-bit addresses and integers, with some support for 128-bit integers, and the general floating-point processing units are capable of handling single, double and quadruple precision floating point numbers (I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader as to what kind of floating point numbers are used). The tensor processing units specialise in half precision floating point operations, while the vector processing units can operate on vectors of up to 4096 bits. All in all, the World Orbs are capable of three exaFLOPS. This is more powerful than even our most powerful supercomputers as of 2018, but pales in comparison to what the Donsilans are capable of in the present day (for them, 128-bit systems are the norm, and even their handheld devices can approach the yottaFLOPS level).

In comparison, the magic devices used by humans in April Light are very slow and short of storage. Uzuki and Tamaki have devices with eight gibibytes and 12 gibibytes of system memory, respectively, both using a 64-bit CPU (quad-core, clocked at 1.0 and 1.3 gigahertz respectively) and possessing somewhere around 400 execution units and 70 gigabytes of flash storage. And these are considered "top-of-the-line" in 2012.

I'll elaborate on what happened to Uzuki in a later episode. But during the battle, Tamaki had an Innocence Shard, and had it activated. While it wasn't established that she had it (she does have a Maleficient Shard, though), keep in mind that Innocence can crystallise under some unusual circumstances (I can tell you that this actually happened in Innocence Seekers: Akari of the Light), and in battle, it may crystallise into a preactivated form.