Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:MvM Chapter5 (section)

===Part 4===

''Bam!!

The sound of incoming destruction was awfully dull.

It came from Misaka Mikoto’s feet landing on the upper floating island after using magnetism to leap straight up 30m with Shokuhou Misaki clinging to her hips.

The armored soldiers turned around in surprise while rolling heavy bombs measuring more than a meter across into position on the edge of the cliff.

“Wha-?”

“Oh, don’t mind us.”

Before they could recover from their shock, bikini armor Mikoto shoved one soldier over the edge with an arm and sent out a lightning spear to pierce through a large ball packed with gunpowder sitting a short distance away.

The one explosion triggered a chain reaction that blasted the soldiers into the air.

“This world’s magic is honestly kind of impressive since I can do all this without worrying about killing them.”

Little Patissiet and Elf Elder Bakerian had already explained that the soldiers wore armor designed to protect against the fire and impact elements to shield them against accidental explosions. The soldiers wouldn’t be killed by the 30m fall either because that would count as the impact element. They would probably be incapacitated for a while, though.

Mikoto didn’t expect this skirmish to settle anything.

The explosions were only a distraction.

This was only laying the groundwork to attack the enemy’s main force while they were still confused.

Mikoto lowered Shokuhou to the ground.

They stood side by side.

Yes.

Celesaqphere’s defense magic did not have an element to protect against lightning or brainwashing.

Bikini armor Mikoto sent lightning spears shooting from her bangs and dancer Shokuhou aimed her TV remote. At this point, the knights and soldiers’ thick armor was only a hindrance to their movement. Some had high-voltage currents pierce their steel armor and others were brainwashed into grabbing at their allies.

When Shokuhou saw the especially strong and muscular armored soldiers, she actually licked her lips alluringly. She could brainwash anyone into being her pawn, so a formidable foe wasn’t necessarily a bad thing for her.

“So many to choose from☆”

Although the way the scantily-clad dancer viewed the group of sweaty, muscular men with such eager delight could easily lead someone to misconstrue her intentions.

A great storm of chaos followed.

“Vanguard, escape to the sides!! We’ll blow them away with our artillery!!”

One soldier raised his unsheathed sword vertically.

That might seem like a cool ritual, but he was in fact taking an estimated measurement of the distance and angle to the enemy for aiming purposes. Behind him were siege weapons that looked like crossbows of more than 2m mounted on wheeled pedestals larger than a light car.

They were ballistae.

The stationary weapons used the elasticity of wood or animal tendons and the torsion of twisted rope to launch giant bolts. The bolts were more than 2m long and some of the ballistae were loaded with thick, wrapped chains measuring several meters long. When launched while spinning, that would be like shooting a giant version of that thing at the end of a weed cutter. A direct hit could probably slice right through a human torso. If their rotation could also stabilize their trajectory, they might also be able to fly like a frisbee.

(The projectiles are made of bronze. I can’t stop them with magnetism!!)

But…

“Shokuhou, charge ahead!!”

“Huh?”

“We’ll be killed if we fall back. I can’t stop the first shot, so the best plan is to not give them enough time to load the second shot!!”

The air was compressed.

Mikoto ran in with an iron sand sword in hand and Shokuhou stepped on one of her dancer outfit’s frills and tripped as something sharply scorched the air between the two of them. It was close, but it wasn’t too fast for Mikoto to dodge with her microwave radar.

“Hey!! Does that mean it was just dumb luck that I survived that!?” protested Shokuhou.

“(Tch. I’d really rather not accept that luck is an aspect of skill.)”

The ballistae were extremely powerful weapons, but it took multiple muscular soldiers to load a bolt, making this a battle of physical strength.

(They have plenty of ballistae, so why aren’t they splitting the work into phases so they can keep a constant stream of shots flying? Are they just stupid?)

Now that the enemy had screwed up, it was Mikoto’s turn.

“Ahhhh!!” she shouted, swinging her iron sand sword horizontally.

She sliced through the base of the targeting soldier’s sword. When he froze up in surprise, she kicked the him in the gut, sending him tumbling backwards. The armor must have shifted his center of gravity unusually high. And before he could get back up, Mikoto aimed her palm down and sent a few high-voltage jolts into him to silence him.

A griffin larger than an elephant puffed out its wings and glared at her. The soldiers must have released the reins of the monster they had used to drag in the ballista carts that rivalled two-story buildings in size. Bikini Mikoto used the bright light and loud noise of the high-voltage electricity to keep the griffin away while she shouted.

“Get up, Shokuhou! I’ll deal with the monster, so you hurry up and brainwash the ballista soldiers!!”

“Argh. Misaka-san, why don’t you – pant – take care of it all – gasp – on your own? Ugh…”

“Don’t just give up and wilt there, you weakling Queen!! None of this is over yet!!”

That was when Mikoto and Shokuhou heard a dull thud.

The sun was hidden overhead. By something around 200m above them.

Another floating island had joined the battle.

But the Railgun’s range was only 50m and lightning spears and iron sand swords would have a hard time attacking and destroying the underside of a floating island that had to be measured in kilometers.

At this rate, the enemy commander would escape.

In fact, they would be killed by falling bombs with no way of fighting back!!