Story Time- Digital Devil Saga.

Prologue: Chapter 1
   This story takes place eighteen years ago, when most people did not even know of the existence of the Internet, and personal computers were normally thought of as standalone devices.
   In the town called Kuniritsu, a suburb of Tokyo, there was a school known as Jusho High. Everything began in this school one day when a tall student burst into the classroom, as if he was just waiting for class to end.
   "You Nakajima?"
   The tall student stormed over to the seat of Nakajima Akemi, a handsome young man who stood out amongst the rest of his class, and slammed the top of the desk as if to threaten him.
   "Yes, that's me..."
   Ignoring the sudden vibration that the desk sent through his body, Nakajima stood up resolutely and looked the student in the eye. It was Kondo Hiroyuki, the captain of the karate club and the unofficial "boss" of Jusho High among the students. In the past he had forced more than one student that had dared to oppose him to change schools--usually through violent means. But Nakajima had never even interacted with Kondo before; he certainly couldn't think of anything that he might have done to make him this angry.
   What gives? I haven't done anything.
   Nakajima gulped and started to open his parched mouth to speak. At that moment, he heard a suppressed giggle from behind him. Turning his head, Nakajima saw a bewitchingly charming girl, one that almost seemed too old to be a student, staring at him like a cat with a gaze that was alluring and at the same time full of malice. It was Takamizawa Kyoko, one of his classmates. All of a sudden, Nakajima understood everything.
   "Hold on a minute!"
   The same instant Nakajima spoke, a fist went flying into his solar plexus. Without even a chance to cry out, Nakajima spun to the floor, as Kondo followed up his punch with a low kick. That was followed by two kicks to both the chest and the lower stomach--carefully placed with enough force to hurt badly, but not knock their target out. Nakajima's classmates, afraid of getting involved, started to leave the classroom one by one.
   "Hear me out...." Nakajima tried hard to protest, but his voice was silenced as Kondo's foot went flying into his mouth, and his tears and saliva spilled out all over the floor.
   "I don't wanna hear your excuses. You gotta learn what happens to people who come on to Kyoko."
   Kondo kicked Nakajima in the back, knocking him onto his stomach on the ground. Kyoko, who all the meantime was gleefully watching him get pummeled, kneeled down in front of him and flicked his upper lip with her fingers.
    "He's got a face like a woman, yet he dared to try and kiss me!"
   "Liar..."
   In actuality, it was Kyoko who tried to kiss him, and Nakajima had just pushed her away. After having her pride hurt, Kyoko used Kondo--who had a large crush on her--to get her revenge. But Nakajima didn't have a single friend to corroborate his story. Only his classmate Takai Ken'ichi remained in the room, and even he just stood there looking worriedly at Nakajima through dark green-rimmed glasses, apparently not having the courage to stop Kondo.
   Pulling Nakajima up from the floor easily with just his left hand, Kondo thrust his right fist into Nakajima's solar plexus again. The pain felt almost as if his heart was being torn out, and Nakajima tried to cry out. But with the wind knocked out out of him, he could neither inhale nor exhale, and all that left his injured lips was a pathetic little moan.
   Nakajima had always been something of an independent maverick, not wanting to hurt anyone or get hurt himself, so he had never been beaten like this before. And to think that it was over some stupid reason like rejecting a girl! The combined sensations of pain, anger, and humiliation overwhelmed Nakajima, and the wound in his psyche started to bleed a drop at a time. Seeing him like this, Kyoko watched Nakajima with a look of pure ecstasy in her eyes, and laughed out loud. The sound of her high-pitched laugh reverberating throughout the classroom pierced Nakajima's eardrums and echoed in his skull, awakening an emotion he had never experienced before deep within him.
   Damn you...I'll get you...you won't get away with this...
   Nakajima's eyes lit up with a fierce, violent look he had never shown before.
   "What's with that look?"
   Kondo was taken aback for a second by Nakajima's expression, and as if mad at himself for faltering, he punched Nakajima hard in the face. As the crunch of Nakajima's tooth cracking sounded, Kyoko said "Hey, don't you think that's enough?" as if she had lost interest in the whole thing. It was the voice of a dirty, cowardly woman, worried only about protecting herself; if Nakajima was beaten any harder, there would be a real danger of her being held responsible.
   "Hey, lucky you! Looks like you've gotten a reprieve. I've gotta say I'm surprised at what a weak little runt you are. Beating you up was just a waste of energy." Twisting his mouth into a smile, Kondo unceremoniously dumped Nakajima's body on the floor like a rag doll.

   An hour later, after finally being able to move, Nakajima reached the Chuo-sen Kunitachi train station, supported by Takai Ken'ichi.
   "Why don't we sit down?" While propping up Nakajima, Takai cocked his head in the direction of two open seats next to each other nearby.
   "Eh?...Oh, sure."
   Nakajima collapsed onto the seat and stared forward resolutely, all the while regretting he had ever applied to his school.
   Jusho Private High was a famous and prestigious school, and every year more than twenty of its students were admitted to Tokyo University. However, anyone that was familiar with the way the school worked would have to acknowledge the extreme stratification amongst the students. The school was divided into two classes; the general class, and the "gifted" class, which received better facilities, a better curriculum, better teaching materials, and in general were favored much more highly. The "gifted" class, which comprised only about twenty percent of the student body, was always the target of constant jealousy and disgruntlement from the general class. With such a gulf between the classes, the violent incidents that came about from this jealousy were to an extent unavoidable.
   Both Nakajima and Takai were part of the gifted class. With his slender frame and delicate looks, if Nakajima swapped his uniform for a girl's sailor suit, he might very well be able to pass for a beautiful teenage girl. Takai's appearance on the other hand was almost the polar opposite. He had a rugged body and thick fingers built up from judo practice, which he had started in junior high. But his personality was not as tough as his exterior, and when he put on his dark green-rimmed glasses, he looked almost like a child.
   "That Kondo, he seemed even worse than usual today." Takai spoke almost as if making excuses; he felt a little guilty for not stepping in to help Nakajima.
   Nakajima raised an eyebrow and responded half-heartedly. "His energy doubles whenever he's near a woman."
   "What the heck is someone like Kyoko doing in the gifted class anyway? Besides, you'd never come on to her in the first place."
   "Actually...it was the other way around."
   "So it was Kyoko that got rejected then." Takai nodded as if everything suddenly made sense. Lots of girls were interested in Nakajima, but none of them so far had been able to strike his fancy. Seeing his indifference, Takai always guessed that Nakajima must have extremely finicky tastes when it came to women.
   The two sat next to each other in silence as the train passed through Musashi-Sakai station. Takai took a sidelong glance at Nakajima's profile. Among the students of the gifted class, Nakajima's grades were not particularly high. In contrast to Takai, who got good grades in just about everything, Nakajima was really only good at math and science. In the more liberal arts, the only subject he showed real strength in was world history. He wasn't much of an athlete either. However, when it came to computers, nobody in school came even close to being as good as Nakajima--not even the teachers. Takai thought that you probably wouldn't be able to find someone who was as good as Nakajima in that arena if you searched all of Japan, let alone the school. The games that Nakajima would whip up in a matter of days were fantastic. No matter how popular they were, commercial games just seemed boring after playing one of Nakajima's. Sometimes Nakajima's expression looked positively mad as he hunched over one of the terminals writing programs in the school's CAI (Computer Aided Instruction) room, his fingers flying across the keyboard.
   If I'm a prodigy, then Nakajima must be a bona-fide genius. Takai nodded to himself as his gaze turned back to the scenery passing by outside the window.
   "Demons, eh...?" The words tumbled out of Nakajima's mouth suddenly.
   "Eh?"
   "No, never mind."
   "Did you just..."
   Just as Takai pursed his lips as if to say something, the train arrived at Nishi-Ogikubo station.
   "See you."
   Nakajima started to walk down the station stairs with his shoulders hunched and a brooding expression on his face.
   "Geez, what is he thinking?" Turning away from Nakajima, Takai plopped himself down on the two now-empty seats of the train.

Prologue: Chapter 2
   Behind the shopping district, a banner reading "Lots for Sale" hung from a newly-built apartment building. Nakamjima walked ahead, looking downwards while continuously moving his lips. To any passerby, he might have appeared like an ordinary high school student, deep in concentration trying to memorize something for a test. But those few people that caught a fragment of the words he was speaking turned around and gave him suspicious looks. That was because they sounded like the low and hostile muttering of a dark spell, and not at all something that you would expect to hear from a high school student. A cherry blossom fell from the nearby concrete wall and hit Nakajima's cheek, but he ignored it and kept walking, his eyes cast down to the ground. When he finally looked up, he was standing in front of a conspicuously tall apartment building. Placing his electronic key into the keyhole, the solid plate-glass automatic doors slid open with a heavy sound. The entrance to the building was made from extravagant imported Canadian marble, but still seemed somewhat artificial. Stepping inside, Nakajima took a deep breath and straightened up.
   Nakajima entered the elevator and pressed the button to the thirteenth floor. With the change in air pressure, his body started to hurt, reminding him of the unpleasant events of the afternoon. A copper plaque with the word "NAKAJIMA" engraved on it was affixed to the door to apartment 1302. Nakajima pressed the doorbell, but there was no response. Sighing, he unlocked the door.
   Opening the door and going inside, Nakajima took off his shoes, threw them aside randomly, and headed to the bathroom. The injured lip of the face looking back at him in the mirror had swollen up like a balloon, and was quite unpleasant to look at. His left cheek had a yellowish bruise on it as well. After looking at himself in the mirror for a bit, Nakajima abruptly turned on the faucet and splashed his face with the water that came pouring out. Returning to the living room and collapsing on the sofa, he noticed a memo on the side table.
   "I'm going to be late at a meeting. Heat up your dinner in the microwave...."
   Nakajima crumpled up the note without reading it to the end.
   "If you're just going to write the same old excuse, you might as well just photocopy the thing..."
   After Nakajima's father was transferred to the branch office in Los Angeles, his mother had become more and more involved in her job as a designer. Sometimes she wouldn't get home until the middle of the night. Picturing his mother's face, Nakajima's smoldering anger suddenly flared up. Right at that moment, the telephone rang. Of course, it was probably for his mother. Glaring at the ringing phone, Nakajima opened the door to his room.
   Nakajima's room was quite dreary, without a single poster or decoration. With the exception of the one with the window, the walls were filled with large steel bookshelves that stretched to the ceiling. The bookshelves had anime magazines and comic books, much like one would expect to find in a high school student's room, but one corner seemed starkly out of place. That shelf was filled with books on magic and sorcery with titles like "The Book of the Dead" and "Pnakotic Manuscripts." On top of his steel desk sat a fully decked-out computer, and sitting next to it was a general-purpose book on magic called "The New Golden Dawn Theory." From the look of the wear on the leather cover, it was clear that the book had seen a lot use.
   Nakajima pulled his chair out from the desk and sat down in front of the display. Turning on the switch on the side of his speakers, the vocals of David Coverdale filled the room. Nakajima's fingers started flying over the keyboard.
LIST
   Entering the command, a very long program scrolled down the screen. Following the program list with sharp eyes, Nakajima started tapping the keys with a flowing rythm.
   Nakajima first became interested in magic when he had the opportunity to read "The New Golden Dawn Theory." While the book was poorly written, and the interpretation therein was clumsy and unskillful, Nakajima read through the whole thing regardless; while the world of magic held an appeal that hid a dark and sinister side, it also showed a rational and scientific realism to it as well. While re-reading passages that seemed to unusual to him two or three times over, Nakajima had made a sudden realization that was almost like an epiphany.
   Magical theory and computer theory were surprisingly similar.
   At first glance, the two worlds did not seem to have any connection to each other. However, the similiarities between them had been discovered by both magic and information technology researchers long before Nakajima. Charles Feed, a professor at MIT, a school famous for its study of artificial intelligence, was one of those researchers. Nakajima had immediately become a member of his group, ISG. (International Satanist Garden) And for the past few months, Nakajima had been immersed in writing a program to summon demons, the idea for which he had thought up himslf.
   It was almost complete.
   Nakajima had already finished the core part of the program. All he had to do now was add a few subroutines and it would be finished. But until yesterday, Nakajima had had reservations about finishing the project to completion. If his theory was correct, the program would definitely call a demon into the world. But up until this point, Nakajima couldn't think of any particular reason to summon a demon; he wouldn't even know what to make it do. But the events of the day had given him a clear, simple, goal.
   "I feel a little sorry for you, but you're going to be the subject of a little experiment." Nakajima started creating his final subroutines.
   "Use data addresses 3780-3990 for 'Toad's Legs.' Put this in the buffer, and before displaying the result, chant the spell. Yod, Dur, Dawr, Set. Wonder what this spell means?"
   Picking up the modem receiver, Nakajima called Arkham in Massachusetts, to connect with ISG's host computer. As the connection picked up, his computer's display filled with the image of the demon Lucifer. Calling up the AI, Craft, and explaining the situation, he asked about the spell. Nakajima's English was not particularly good, so several times the only thing that appeared on-screen were question marks.
OK, I UNDERSTAND.
   Finally, Craft appeared to have gotten it; Nakajima asked the AI what the spell meant.
PERHAPS IT'S ONLY A COUNTER?
   Craft's response probably indicated that the spell was only a time counter.
THANK YOU, CRAFT.
   Cutting the connection to ISG, Nakajima set himself to the task of writing the subroutine once again. Two hours later, there was a knock on his door.
   "Come on in." With a hint of irritation in his voice, Nakajima responded to the knock without taking his eyes off the program list on-screen.
   "Did you eat dinner?"
   "...."
   Nakajima didn't respond, and just kept typing on the keyboard.
   "Oh, what happened to your lip?" Nakajima's mother bent down from behind him to take a good look at his face.
   "I ran into the goalpost playing soccer." Nakajima stopped typing and looked back at his mother. Nakajima had a strong resemblence to his mother, who was a beautiful woman with a slender face. When they were together, they would frequently be mistaken for siblings. When it came to her son's education, she was very conservative; she wanted him to get into Keio University's medical school. Of course, there were too many blemishes on his academic record for that to ever happen.
   "Shouldn't you put some medicine on it?"
   "It's OK, mom. It's not serious."
   Irritated at his programming being interrupted, Nakajima absentmindedly tapped keys at random on the keyboard.
   BEEP.
   The computer made a harsh tone, and an error message appeared on-screen. As if realizing that her son wasn't going to pay her any heed, Nakajima's mother left the room as if giving up.

   That night, at 3AM.
   "All right, it's done!"
   Nakajima slapped his thighs with his hands and stood up from his chair.
RUN
   The disk drive started whining, and bizarre letters blinked on and off the screen. But in less than five minutes, the screen displayed an error message and stopped.
OUT OF MEMORY
   If there wasn't enough memory for the program, it was probably either because the program itself was too long, or because it dealt with more variables than the machine could handle.
   "No big deal. One little computer isn't enough to run a program like this anyway. If I use the school's host computer, it should have more than enough memory."
   Nakajima's eyes glittered with anticipation.

Prologue: Chapter 3
   Later that week, at 7PM on Saturday, Professor Iida, who was on night watch, noticed that there was someone in the CAI room and opened the door.
   "Who's here at a time like this?"
   At the sound of his voice, a student looked up from one of the CAI terminals, his face glowing strangely in the reflected light of the display.
   Iida's expression softened. "Oh, it's just you, Nakajima. What are you doing in here with all the lights off?"
   Nakajima's academic record was far from perfect, but his genius had endeared him somewhat to the math and science teachers and earned their trust.
   "My program's just not working out the way I wanted to. But I'm almost done fixing it." Nakajima's voice seemed slightly metallic, as if in tune with the sound of the disk drive spinning.
   "I'm always happy to see your enthusiasm, but you know that you need to ask permission in advance if you want to work in this classroom late at night. You're lucky that it was me that found you instead of someone else." Scolding Nakajima, Iida flicked on the light switch.
   "What is this!?" Iida's shocked voice echoed through the now-lit CAI room. A large geometric figure was drawn on the floor in white and red chalk, with Nakajima's seat situatuated at the center.
   "It's a Solomon Hexagram."
   "Solomon? That has an occultish sound to it." Nakajima paid Iida's sarcasm no heed, and his fingers slid over the keys of the terminal. Presently the host computer located in the adjacent machine room sealed off by thick glass walls started to run.
   "Great, the bugs are finally gone. It's done!" After sending a print job to to print out the contents of the program list, Nakajima stood and turned toward Iida. His girlish, almond eyes glittered in a demonic grin. The wound in his lip that he had gotten when Kondo beat him up had since sealed, but the excitement had reopened the cut, and a trickle of fresh blood stained his jaw.
   Iida's gaze became stern. "All right, Nakajima, do you want to explain just what kind of program you're running on the host computer--and without permission, I might add?"
   Nakajima brushed aside some hair from his forehead and responded nonchalantly. "I've written a program that will summon demons. This hexagram is here to protect me from them. In just a moment a demon will appear. Professor, you should probably enter inside it too. You might get shredded to pieces otherwise."
   For an instant, Iida's mouth gaped open, and he took a long hard look at Nakajima.
   "Have you lost it?"
   "Is it me who's lost it, or the school? Professor, take a good look at me. This wound on my lip, the bruise on my face. I got the crap beaten out of me by Kondo from the karate club. Takamizawa Kyoko is just as guilty. The school just lets wild animals like that run free, and doesn't do anything to deal with them at all. No matter what happens to me in the classroom, the teachers and students just pretend it didn't happen. The violence that happens in this school is as plain as day, and yet nobody gets punished. I suppose the teachers are just waiting for students like that to graduate. As long as they keep their eyes shut, the calamity will just clear itself up on its own; they just have to endure it for two or three years. But this is the only time I get to be a high school student. I'm not going to let them just do whatever the hell they want any more. I'm going to summon a demon and execute those annoying insects." Nakajima's speech seemed excited and his shoulders rose and fell in time with his wild breathing.
   Nakajima turned away from the stunned Iida and to the keyboard.
RUN
   With the final command displayed on the monitor, the magnetic tape of the host computer started to gradually spin. Iida tried to yell at Nakajima and stop the computer. But the moment he opened his lips, a frigid breeze from nowhere struck him and covered his arms in goosebumps.
   "Summoning demons with a computer...what a concept!" Iida twisted his lips into a smile to hide his fear.
   "Computer theory and magical thought have many overlapping similarities. I bet the first person who thought up the principles of computing was an alchemist or Kabbalist. It's not that well-known, but things like spells, sacrifices, and thaumaturgic circles are very easy to put into binary format. Summoning a demon is just a transfer of the matter comprising the demon in the Atziluth World to the real Assiah World, and a computer is the perfect device to facilitate it."
   While Nakajima was explaining his theory, the cold air wrapped around Iida almost like a living creature, and a bizarre smell entered his nostrils. The lights of the classroom flickered out, and the CAI room plunged into darkness, the only sound that of the spinning disk drive. Presently the computer let out a low whine.
   "Yod, Heh, Vav, Heh." To Iida's ears, the whine sounded like actual, real words.
   "Yod, Heh, Vav, Heh." While whispering in synch with the computer, Nakajima continued to enter commands on the keyboard with unbelievable speed. Soon the entire room started to shake like an earthquake, and cracks formed in the windows. At the same time, Nakajima entered his final command.
KILL! KONDO HIROYUKI, TAKAMIZAWA KYOKO
   Iida did not like students like Kondo Hiroyuki and Takamizawa Kyoko. In fact, he hated them. But he felt even more repulsed by the manner in which Nakajima intended to deal with them.
   "Stop this foolishness. If you'd like, I can make sure the incident is investigated fully and have Kondo expelled. Just stop doing this."
   While stumbling in the shaking room, Iida desperately reached for the computer's power switch. To prevent him from interfering, Nakajima grabbed his arm with a strength one wouldn't even imagine him displaying normally. However, while the two struggled, the rumbling started to subside. The fluorescent lights lit up with a creaking sound and filled the room with light, and the freezing air about Iida's body dissipated.
   "Where did you go!? Why won't you show yourself? Demon, are you going to abandon me?"
Crying out, Nakajima headed toward the keyboard.
KILL! KILL!
   But the host computer's magnetic tape slowly and mercilessly started spinning to a halt. Anxiously opening the program list, Nakajima scanned the details of the program with bloodshot eyes and aimlessly stood as if sapped of all his vitality.
   "My program was perfect. There wasn't a single bug in it. So why did the demon vanish before showing itself? It should have appeared right over there!" Leaving the program list open, Nakajima stumbled out of the CAI room as if in a trance. Staring dumbfoundedly at Nakajima's back as he left, Iida finally came to his senses and turned off the power to the computer.
   "I guess it's true how they say that there's a fine line between genius and insanity. That was one hell of an earthquake though." Iida whispered as if trying to purge his memory of the repulsive experience.

Prologue: Chapter 4
   The next week, Iida was teaching Nakajima Akemi and Takamizawa Kyoko's class math in the CAI Room. Perhaps it was because he was there to witness the failure of the demon summoning, but Nakajima was looking at Iida with a defiant stare. Until now, he would never have acted like this. Trying hard to ignore him, Iida continued his lesson.
   "Now I'm going to have you take an interactive test using the host computer. However, this test won't affect your grades in any way. Through your interaction with the computer, I'd like you to get a little bit more familiar with any weak points you may have. Begin entering your commands as soon as I give the signal."
   The students all affixed their eyes to their screens and silently started answering the questions given them, as the host computer started diligently recording their individual responses.
   Once use of CAI spreads, things will get a lot easier for us teachers. Though if it becomes too widespread, the time may come that we teachers aren't neeeded any more... Iida carefully watched over his class while relaxing a bit.
   All of a sudden, as if coming from the depths of the earth itself, a low, rumbling voice sounded and shook the CAI room.
   "Yod, Heh, Vav, Heh."
   The magnetic tape of the host computer started spinning wildly and the screens of the computers in the room started changing rapidly. Eerie colors and strange images flashed onscreen, and strange letter-like symbols appeared and disappeared. The students said nothing, but remained transfixed to their screens as if entrhalled.
   "Nakajima, this is your doing, isn't it? Come on now, there's nothing wrong with a little mischief once in a while, but there are limits!" Twisting his face into an dark scowl, Iida started to walk over to Nakajima's seat, but the moment he started walking a student in the first row stuck his leg out into the aisle, tripping the teacher and causing him to clumsily fall forward. As Iida tried to get up, two more students slammed into his back, pinning him to the ground and twisting his arms behind him.
   "Wh-what are you doing!? Stop this at once!" Taken aback at the sudden hostility of his students, Iida struggled to lift his head up while crying out. The other students, staring ahead with glazed looks as if in a trance, stood up from their seats. Three male students left the classroom, and the others gradually started to surround Takamizawa Kyoko.
   Her face drained of color, Kyoko stared dumbfoundedly at her classmates surrounding her. Her catlike eyes were full of fear, her lips trembling up and down but held shut as if sewn together. A male student with thick glasses touched her chest, and as if freed from a curse, Kyoko lept up onto the desk.
   "Stay away from me, asshole!" Kyoko yelled out desperately, whipping out a razor blade held between her thumb and middle finger.
   "Stop, Takamizwa. Run!" Iida's shaking voice echoed throughout the classrom. But Kyoko merely took a sidelong glance at her restrained teacher, spat, and swung her razor at the student that had touched her. The student's glasses flew off, and his split cheek started oozing fresh blood. But the student did not falter a bit or even try to wipe off the blood, but obstinantly grabbed onto Kyoko's left ankle.
   "Let go of me, asshole!" The razor slashed open the student's temple, and then lodged into his blood-soaked arm, breaking in two. Taking advantage of Kyoko's surprise, another student grabbed her left angle, and the two students now gripping both her legs raised their arms, hoisting her up in the air and dangling her upside-down. Her skirt fell down around her waist, revealing her white legs. Kano Miyuki, one of the most beautiful girls in the school along with Kyoko, walked up, put her face in between Kyoko's legs, and bit into her inner thigh. Bending backward in pain, Kyoko attempted to fight back, flailing her arms around like an animal caught in a trap, her drooping hair swishing wildly around, but several students knelt down by her head and started to twist her neck around.
   "Stop! Stop this!"
   As Iida cried out with tears in his eyes, a cold voice spoke.
   "Professor, it's too late." Nakajima, who had been at his computer entering commands the whole time, looked at Iida with a sarcastic smile on his face.
   "Ooh..."
   With a meager cry, Kyoko's legs spasmed two or three times. Without even attempting to wipe the blood from her face, Miyuki looked up and the two students holding Kyoko in the air let go of her legs. As Kyoko's twisted, lifeless body dropped to the floor, the circle of students started to break up, leaving her behind.

   Right about that time, the door opened, and the three students that had left earlier entered the room, Kondo following behind them. After hearing that Kyoko was being ganged up on and verbally harrassed by her classmates, Kondo came with a mind to teach the "know-it-alls" of the gifted class a lesson. However, the classroom was completely silent, and not at all what he was expecting. The three students led the perplexed Kondo to the center of the room, then quickly moved away.
   "Oh my god..."
   Seeing Kyoko's corpse, Kondo was dumbfounded and words escaped him for a moment. The students in the classroom surrounded him, as if to cut off his path of retreat. At that point, Kondo probably could have gotten away had he set his mind to it. But with his mind clouded with shock and anger, Kondo didn't realize just how dangerous a position he had walked into.
   "You bastards, what have you done...who killed Kyoko!?"
   His body shuddering in rage, Kondo's furious, bloodshot eyes turned to the students. But the normally meek students, who would usually run away if Kondo merely looked at them, showed no signs of fear, and returned his harsh gaze.
   There was something seriously strange going on here.
   At that moment, a groan sounded. Looking in the direction of the voice, Kondo saw Nakajima standing over Iida with his foot pinning the teacher's head to the ground.
   "Nakajima...?"
   Not evening imagining for a moment that such a genius pretty-boy could be capable of something like this, Kondo was completely taken aback.
   Iida called out to him from the back of his throat. "Kondo, run! Everyone's gone mad!"
   Called back to his senses by the teacher's voice, Kondo howled like a wild animal and charged Nakajima. But right before he reached Nakajima, a dozen students jumped on him and pulled him to the ground. Struggling with all his might, Kondo knocked off the students clinging to them, punching and kicking any that got close. But even with their foreheads split and their ribs shattered, the students picked themselves off the floor as if they felt no pain at all, and fiercely grabbed onto Kondo. One of them picked up a computer monitor and hit him hard in the back of the head with it. Kondo's vision blurred with the shock of the blow and started to stumble, and in that instant, the students pulled him to the floor again and restrained his limbs.
   "Shit, let me go! I'll kill you!!"
   Looking at at Kondo vainly struggling against the students, trying to get free, Nakajima's handsome face twisted into a cold smile.
   "Actually, you're the only one who's going to be killed here. I was hoping to have Kyoko be your executioner, but as you've seen, she's already died. So I've been nice enough to have Miyuki do the job for her; you should thank me."
   Cradling his chin in his hand as if in thought, Miyuku kneeled down near Kondo and brought her face close to his, her chin still covered in Kyoko's blood. Her warm breath caressed his cheek. Kond's body stiffened up and shivered a bit, and in that instant, the knife in Miyuki's hand flashed and was drenched in crimson. A gurgling cry came out of Kondo's severed windpipe, and with his eyes still open, his head folded backward with a sickening crunch.
   "Now then, Professor." Nakajima crouched down and looked into Iida's face.
   "What do you think, Professor? You see? My demon summoning experiment wasn't a failure. That day, a demon really did appear--inside the CAI host computer. We just didn't realize it. When I was in class here in the CAI room yesterday, the demon sent me a message: "KILL! I UNDERSTOOD" He can't escape from the computer, so he used group hypnosis to control the class. By the way, Professor, I promised to give three souls to the demon. Kyoko's, Kondo's, and one other..."
   For an instant, Nakajima's eyes glittered with an emotion like pity. But as if to surpress it, he pressed his lips together and stood up.
   "W-wait, please wait..." As Iida desperately wheezed and struggled, ten students dragged their feet along the floor, slowly approaching him.

Bored and surprised that I havent been banned yet. Read the rest here: http://ddstranslation.blogspot.com/2006/08/prologue-chapter-4.html

SMT FTW!

>>6
You mean MT.

Is this a direct translation of the Megami Tensei novel?  I've been curious about that.

Yes, it's a fan translation made by Masakado. Unfortunately he didn't (and probably won't) translated the third book.

>>9
yeah, I wish he did.

I had read books 1 and 2.  Freaky shit, to be sure, and a real shame it never made it to America in English.  it would have seriously changed the way we approached the horror genre in the late 70's and early 80's.  What a concept, though!  Summoning Demons with computers.  It gets better.  Shame Masakado hasn't translated Book 3.  I want it so bad...!