"Acura's Story" (From The Dengeki Nintendo Magazine)

Inti Creates is no stranger to releasing side-story content for their games. For Gunvolt alone they've released two drama track CDs (with another coming soon), a side-story that was expanded upon every week for a couple months (which is also scheduled to continue), and a short epilogue in the official Gunvolt soundtrack that narrated Acura's fate following the true ending of the first game.

Suffice to say that Inti's been very generous with behind-the-scenes story information, particularly regarding Acura. And surprise surprise, they've recently published another bit of Gunvolt side-story content exclusive to the Japanese Dengeki Nintendo magazine!

The story in question explains what happened to Acura following his second fight with Gunvolt at Babel, and his unlucky encounter with Asimov. The narrative expanded over three issues of Dengeki Nintendo. It's quite a fascinating read, in addition to being very enlightening! I know I've certainly wondered before what transpired between Asimov and Acura at Babel. Sure, we already knew they got into a fight and Asimov came out the winner, but how exactly did that come to pass? Neither Asimov nor Acura were weaklings, so we could only assume that a huge battle took place between them. Well, thanks to Inti, we now have the full story!
Huge thanks to Zoram Selrof, who was kind enough to translate the entirety of this narration and send it to me to feature exclusively on this site! You can check out his translation below. And if you want to compare the English translation to the original Japanese text from the magazine, he transcribed that all here. Enjoy, folks!

Acura’s Story

Translated by Zoram Selrof

Insides of Sumeragi’s satellite base “Heaven’s Floating Bridge”...

“Kuh!”

“Acura...”

Standing in front of Acura, who’s dropped his knees into the ground, his whole body filled with wounds, was a young man -- Gunvolt.

The very first 7th wave (Sevens) to be called the “strongest”, the “Azure Thunderclap (Armed Blue)” that can control electrons, Gunvolt was a Psychic with that ability.

Acura’s had his 2nd chance encounter with Gunvolt here, on Heaven’s Floating Bridge.

Acura has challenged him to battle with his creed of “I will make sure to kill any 7th wave Psychics that appear in front of me” and had been defeated.  

Why…? Why didn’t I win?

He’d gone to the ends of having him fight the Sumeragi Psychics and then bring down the survivor so as to achieve his goal: that should’ve been efficient enough.

But it was true that he wasn’t in a situation in which he could choose how to fight the 7th wave Psychics, monsters beyond human knowledge.

He’d done a lot of things insofar to be able to kill Psychics.

Developing a special jacket that would mechanically support his body, so as to be capable of fighting the enemies strengthened by the “Swords”.

Tireless training day after day to be able to perfectly employ the jacket.

He rummaged like a hyena the fragments of “Swords” from the remains of the Sumeragi Psychics that Gunvolt killed and retrieved the 7th wave Incenting Factors.

Develop a gear that was able to pseudo-recreate the 7th wave based on that data --- and kill the Psychics (Monsters) even if he had to employ a power that was similar to the evil power that he hated, the 7th wave.

Acura, being a “mere human”, had no other choice but to do that to be able to fight the 7th wave Psychics.

Things should’ve been different the first time, back when he’d first encountered Gunvolt.

It was an unexpected encounter, so he’d jammed Gunvolt’s transmission equipment to isolate him and readied special bullets that were also effective against the Thunder Psychic.

And when the battle turned back-foot, he’d postpone it for the next chance, and pull out… But, then, why did things turn out like this?

Ego, anger, impatience --- all types of emotions cross his mind.

Acura naturally strongly clenched the grip touching his fist.

And he’s startled.

This…?

That was a memento of his dead father, a revolver gun.

The bullets loaded on that gun, named “Greed Snatcher”, had the effect of spreading all across the air and disturbing a Psychic’s 7th wave flow.

It was a Pseudo 7th wave (Copy Ability) analyzed from a magnetism Psychic.

Acura remembers.

This ability’s original owner was a guy with encephalomyopathy (an idiot) who only was able to recklessly swing his strong power around.

A man who didn’t understand his own Ability’s usefulness at all.

That was why, despite Acura’s developed Greed Snatcher being a copy that had its power drastically reduced to something inferior, it displayed effects better than the original in terms of maneuverability.

Acura had felt the joy when he’d completed the Greed Snatcher, something that became an absolute threat to any Psychic.

These bullets, unlike the other Copy Abilities, were not installed in the shield that employed them (Aixgear) but in the revolver gun that was his father’s memento: that was because there was some anxiety about using those together with the other Abilities, but it also was a display of romanticism typical of Acura. “I’ll wipe out the 7th wave Psychics with Father’s memento”.  

However, that might’ve been no more than excessive ego for all he knew.

Maybe the fact that he’d gained a sure-kill weapon that would provide an absolute advantage when facing the Psychics had given birth to carelessness on his part.

So that means that I’m as equally foolish as that magnetism Psychic. Dad, I’m sorry… I’ve been deluded by a momentary emotion and failed to fulfill your will…

Acura thought as much. His internal passions were still boiling but, somewhere, he’d coolly realized that those thoughts would probably never clear up anymore.

However…

“I’ve got no time to deal with you now… So I’m leaving.” Gunvolt ignored Acura and left.

“What was that?”

Acura tried to stand up but, suddenly, the jacket’s motor squeaked and began to emit sparks.

In the meanwhile, Gunvolt, without turning back, is swallowed into the depths of Heaven’s Floating Bridge.

I’ve been spared? By that kin-killer demon, “Gunvolt”, that’s buried the Sumeragi Psychics?  

Acura didn’t know it.

That Gunvolt isn’t a ruthless demon.

And that he’s just like Acura: he’s no more than a young man with a narrow field of vision that shakes off what’s right and anything else and fights for those that he believes in.

Acura clenches his teeth.

He thinks that he shouldn’t have talked about his inner feelings, about… his father, to him.

If he’d bought his sympathy by doing that then he was very miserable indeed.

“Lord Acura…”

Nowa’s voice, concerned over Acura, comes out of his transmitter.

No, we’re talking about Nowa.

She might be worrying, but she might also be having pity of him even.

… Acura spits out to try to shake off those abject thoughts.

So that Nowa, on the other side of the transmitter, can hear him.

“Cheap sympathy…”  

He spits out his best bluff, and bolds up his wounded body.

The strengthening jacket’s starting to wear out as well.

The muscles throughout his body were screaming.

I’ve got something to achieve. I can’t lose track of the general picture because I’m fixated with the chaff in front of me.

“I can’t stop Shiden in my current state anyway. Fine. I’ll give up the role of killing the man to you…”  

That’s it. As long as I get the results then that’s fine. Gotta get rid of this stupid pride…

“Go ahead and crush each other, you Psychics (Monsters)… I’ve got no intent of bending my beliefs.”

Acura began to think.

Gunvolt will surely win the upcoming battle.

By looking at his gathered data, he could clearly say that Shiden was the predominant one.

But Acura had a mysterious premonition.

Or it could be that he wished, at the very least, that the man who’d beaten him won: a dwarf desire even.

“One day, I’ll… defeat you for sure… Gunvolt!”

“What do you intend to do now, sir?”

Acura answered to Nowa’s voice coming from the transmitter.

“It’s an unexpected turn of things and the jacket’s suffered a lot of damage. The mission’s cancelled. I’m coming back.”

“An unexpected turn of things…is it.”

Acura, having lost to Gunvolt, and having sustained a lot of damage in both body and equipment, was in no condition to have unnecessary fights.  

The strengthening jacket supporting his body “Meganteleon” seemed to be wearing out as well, since its movements were getting dull here and there.

Since he’d set it up having today’s mission, a prolonged sneaking mission, in mind, the battery consumption had been greatly reduced compared to the usual rate, but the battle he’d just had consumed most of the battery.

Seeing his current state, he reminds himself once again that the 7th wave (Sevens) Psychics, with close to limitless energy supply and high applicability, are indeed monsters outside of the scope.

Gunvolt’s a good example of that. His Thunder Ability can freely change form into a sword or a barrier.

“If that is the case, should I come pick you up, sir?”

Acura pictured Nowa intruding here, into “Heaven’s Floating Bridge”, located in a static orbit, with a heavy gun in one hand and easily shaking off Sumeragi’s soldiers.

He felt scared at how he easily pictured her doing all of that and without changing her facial expression at all.

Nowa’s a normal human without a 7th wave.

She’d been dispatched as a “maid” by the Kamizono head house to be Acura and his sister’s protector and watcher: but, for some reason, she was ignoring the family’s orders, and began to support Acura on his personal revenge.

At the beginning she’d been in charge of the education and care of him and his sister. When Acura decided that he’d take revenge, she procured a great heap of funds from an unknown source, and provided the equipment and info he needed.

She was the one who trained Acura in fighting skills as well, and she displayed activity in all kind of fields, to a level that was above the usual. She was a rather mysterious woman.

Even if one implicitly asked her about her identity, she changed the topic by replying “I am but a maid, so…”, so Acura had ended up giving up on that in part and convincing himself that she was one of the few things in the world that he “needn’t know about”.

“Be reasonable. To begin with: you’ve got no transportation to come all the way here.”

There was no spare of the small spacecraft that Acura had used to intrude into the base.

It looked like that even the capable Nowa had some difficulty in arranging for the spacecraft.

In short, she was talking about the impossible to begin with, and her “pick you up” surely was a joke typical of her…

She’s always indifferent, so it’s hard to know when she’s joking.

“…Understood. Maybe I should stop transmitting to avoid the enemy noticing us, sir.”

“Yeah. I’ll switch this off for a while.”

Acura switched off the transmission equipment and began to move.

His goal was the small spacecraft “Sabertooth”, hidden in the material entrance.

If he could ride into that, he could go back to the surface… Supposing that he wasn’t found out by Sumeragi, of course.

Acura holds his breath and avoids the enemies.

He had some close calls, but he survived the difficulties and made it to the front of the “Sabertooth”.  

But there was someone wholly unexpected there.

A white-haired man with sunglasses was touching the Sabertooth’s white body and peeking into the cockpit.

That’s…

He’d seen him before in some materials he’d gotten from Nowa.

If memory served, his name was Asimov.

He was one of the founding members that had established Feather and a 7th wave Psychic with an unknown ability who fought on the battlefields in person.

So he’d been able to come all the way here even…

“This machine… a vehicle? Doesn’t seem to be a Sumeragi design…” 

Who'd have said that it wouldn’t be a Sumeragi member, but an intruder like him that’d stumble upon the vehicle?

Acura really wanted to curse his bad luck.

“Suspicious… Let’s destroy the suspicious stuff to be on the safe side.”

Asimov takes out a long swing handgun that he carried and removed the manual safely.

If the Sabertooth’s destroyed, then Acura’s escape will become hopeless.

“Won’t let you!!!”

Acura raises his voice to avert his attention: he aims his shield-shaped armament “Aixgear” forward and rams (charges) into Asimov.

“Guh!!”

Asimov is flicked away. But he doesn’t bother to resist the attack.

He’s swept away!

Asimov immediately fixes his posture.

In the meanwhile, Acura changes the Aixgear from shield to bow and loads a weapon cartridge.  

The Aixgear’s now in attack mode to fire a Pseudo 7th wave.

“Burn up! Fury-flames’ anger-bow (Blazing Ballista)!”

The flaming arrow shot by the Aixgear advances while bursting the air.

“Huh!!”

It’s an outlandish behavior arrow that defies common sense.

Asimov puts some distance between them and dodges by jumping sideways; he then counters with his handgun.

However, his shot rounds are blocked by the Aixgear’s armor.

The Aixgear wasn’t originally developed to be a shield, but it was designed to be extremely resistant because it had to be bear the use of the special bullets.

Its endurance performance might’ve decreased due to the battle with GV, but it’s easily blocking the handgun’s bullets.

“Those attacks and that weapon… You’re the Non-Psychic that was in one of GV’s reports, huh? Who’d have said you’d come this far?”

“Hmpf. So that means we both have info about each other.”

Acura quickly changed the weapon cartridge and irradiated a purple light from the Aixgear.

That light could make those who looked at it turn into a very short and temporary suspended animation, the shut-out curse-light “Envy-sight’s snake-eye (Jealous Gorgon)” --- but Asimov began to quickly approach Acura without minding the light as he was bathed by it from the front.

“Sh…!”

Asimov jumped into Acura’s bosom and strongly grabbed the Aixgear with the right hand: he forcefully blocked the light emitted from the muzzle.

“It’s like you said, Non-Psychic. You said that we both had info about each other, right?”

The pupils beyond the sunglasses expanded.

The Jealous Gorgon doesn’t activate unless you look straight into its light.

Asimof had seized that from the battle report that GV had expedited.

“Ha~h!!!”

A blue flash surged out from Asimov's fist grabbing the Aixgear --- the next instant, the Aixgear’s armor and the muzzle below it were shattered.

“You…! That Ability (power)…!”

“A Non-Psychic that can copy our 7th wave (Sevens) is a very dangerous existence indeed… I’ll pierce and destroy you with my Azure Thunderclap (Armed Blue)!”

Blue and white electricity surged out from Asimov’s body.

“!”

He was surprised that Asimov had the same Thunder Ability as GV, but he quickly changed his thoughts.

He should’ve figured it out from the earlier battle.

Emotions of confusion and doubt called him in defeat… And the man in front of him had been capable of gripping and crushing the Gear, unlike Gunvolt, who hadn’t been able to puncture it.

It surely wasn’t a mistake to consider that, despite it being the same Ability, its power was above Gunvolt’s.

He quickly turns the Aixgear with the broken muzzle and aimed the cannon opposite to the one that was destroyed by Asimov.

The Aixgear has 2 cannons equipped on its rear and each one is independent.

Even if one was destroyed, it was possible to use the other one.

“Devour it all! Millions of predators (Million Eater)!”

A colony of light overflows from the muzzle.

Light spores imitating flies gather around Asimov like they had a will of their own and surround him.

But when the light-insects touched Asimov’s body, his flesh became an afterimage and “blurred”.  

That was one of the Azure Thunderclap’s Abilities, to change one’s flesh to electrons and make all kinds of attacks pass through: the invincible EM boundary “Mayfly”.

“Impossible. As long as I’ve got the Mayfly, no attacks can get a hold of me.”

“Obviously. But it can serve as a distraction.”

He pulls the trigger of the revolver gun “Border” with the hand that isn’t holding the Aixgear.

When the bullet is shot from the muzzle, it becomes a black energy spheroid.

It’s a bullet that absorbs all kinds of 7th waves and spreads them, the Special Super Magnetic Bullet “Greedy Usurper (Greed Snatcher)”.

Maybe it was a side-effect, but the Aixgear suddenly stopped moving.

The already fired energy spheroid sucks up the Million Eater as it advances aiming for Asimov.

“!”

Asimov, who'd noticed the bullet’s heterogeneity at the last second, barely managed to turn the attack away.

The energy spheroid skimmed Asimov’s shoulder.

Asimov’s whole body is suddenly struck by lethargy.

It barely touched him, but the Greed Snatcher had sucked out the Thunder Wave from Asimov.

“This is…”

Unable to withstand the sudden energy depletion, Asimov collapsed onto his knees.

“That’s humanity’s wisdom. Humanity, by learning and growing, became able to even hunt large beasts… This bullet wasn’t on the guy’s report, am I right?”

He came closer and aimed the Border at a critical point.

“Be destroyed, evil-doer!”

“Not yet! Voltic Chain!”

Chains tinged with lightning suddenly stretched from Asimov’s legroom and flung the Border away.

“! The Border!”

The still-stretching chains tighten onto the Aixgear and Acura.

“Uo~h!!!”

Like they’d raced to Asimov’s roar, the chains tinged with lightning increased their momentum, and began to strangle Acura while emitting powerful sparks.

“Guwa~h!!”

Asimov quickly stood up and picked up the Border that was lying around.

“A mere damned Non-Psychic was able to build something like this…!”

His consciousness begins to haze.

I won’t… die… here… not… yet…

“Lord Acura~!!”

A familiar woman’s voice hit Acura’s lobes then.

This voice…

A woman clad in maid uniform, totally incongruous to this place, jumped out from within the Sabertooth.

The maid attempted to strike Asimov with a dagger knife.

“Sheesh!”

Asimov, still under the effects of the Greed Snatcher, had no other choice but to dodge.

Given the unexpected intrusion by the maid, his concentration became altered, and noise ran along the image of the Voltic Chains and jolted a little bit.

The maid used that opening.

She quickly grabbed Acura and pulled him away from the Voltic Chain.

And at the same time the maid saved Acura, the Aixgear shattered.

If she had been slower, then Acura’s body might’ve ended up like it…

“Please excuse my lack of manners, sir, but it is an emergency.”

Nowa throws Acura inside the Sabertooth.

Even if the Aixgear, the heaviest piece of Acura’s equipment, had been lost, the Meganteleon was also pretty heavy as well.

She had a lot of strength despite her slender body.

Nowa jumped into the cockpit as well, closed the hatch, and performed an emergency take-off.

Asimov, on the other side of the hatch, shot his own handgun, but it only managed to make a few marks on the Sabertooth’s exterior and the Sabertooth escaped Heaven’s Floating Bridge. 

“Are you alright, Lord Acura?”

“Nowa… Why are you here…?”

“It is a maid’s job to protect you, sir.”

“That’s not it. You’re not going to tell me you were hiding in the Sabertooth all along?”

“It was complicated to transmit to you, Lord Acura, without you noticing me, sir.”

Acura sighs *huff* at how Nowa, as usual, says amazing things without changing her facial expression.

I’d always thought of her as a bottomless woman, but I didn’t expect her to be THIS capable…

“More importantly, that gun… I am deeply sorry that I was unable to retrieve it, sir.”

Acura’s favorite gun and his dead father’s memento, the “Border”.

She must be talking about how Asimov stole it.

“Don’t mind it… You saved my life…”

Acura didn’t say anything else.

He sinks his tired body into the seat, regretting how he’d lowered his guard at the end.

While studying the resolve to retrieve his father’s memento… 

The end

So, what'd you all think? Pretty mind-blowing, huh? You know, I thought I'd go into this getting a lot my questions answered, but instead I just find myself asking more questions! Who is this Nowa character? Have we seen her before? Maybe she's made an appearance in the Fleeting Memories side-story and we didn't know it. It's all pretty puzzling.
Well, at any rate, I think one thing's for sure: this isn't the last we'll be seeing of this mysterious woman!

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