Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:Item2 Chapter1 (section)

===Part 6===

She bore a small but wicked smile.

She looked to be around 10 at the most.

She had brown skin and overly done-up blonde hair. She wore a neon yellow bikini top and a pleated miniskirt held up by suspenders. The outfit was something like a skimpier version of a cheerleader. The water-resistant bikini top repelled the lukewarm raindrops, giving it a wet sheen. And instead of a string holding the top together in the center, it was forcibly held together by wrapping a wire around and around, similar to how large envelopes used to be kept closed. That wire could snap from metal fatigue at any moment.

She held a phone in a case designed to look like bunny ears and a famous chocolate-covered snack stick wiggled where she held it in the corner of her mouth. A box of the snacks was held between the side of her hip and the short skirt. The girl looked like the encyclopedia image of a gyaru except shrunk down to miniature form.

But that wasn’t why Frenda’s eyes bugged out after she and Takitsubo dragged the unconscious driver out of the truck.

“You’re kidding, right? She can’t be any older than 10. In the end, aren’t we supposed to be dealing with a ''marriage scammer'' making a fortune online!?”

“Lame. It’s not like I have to show my face when to let them have some cute conversations using the voice chat provided by a free VoIP app. I usually pretended to be…25, I think it was. Then again, maybe I’d have had an easier time luring in those stupid men if I’d let them see what I really look like. Hwa ha ha☆”

“…”

Mugino Shizuri silently narrowed her eyes, ignoring the way her thin negligee clung to her skin in the rain.

She had been wondering about something.

Supposedly, Meltdowner researchers had been targeted to steal their research data, but that didn’t sit right with her. The damage wasn’t limited to them, but anyone with a Mugino connection performed top secret Level 5 research which was more strictly guarded than the research in other labs. There was no public list of the people who worked in her lab. So how had this external marriage scammer targeted them so accurately?

Now she had her answer.

The culprit was someone with inside information.

“''It was the head researcher''.”

“''Hello, my failure☆ Ugh, lame. You could at least bow when you meet the person who gave you your powers, you know?''”

[[Image:Item2_BW1.jpg|thumb]]

Mugino Shizuri did not hesitate to hold her palm straight out.

The little brown gyaru grinned without making any move to defend herself.

“Sure, sure. I’m all for really going at it to get as much experience as I can☆ Oh, and I’m talking about levelling up in RPGs here. But if the EXP grind is too obviously only there to waste my time, I’ll just use some cheat codes without a second thought. Hwa ha ha. Anyway, I’m down for a cool battle. They do say hardship at a young age builds character, right?”

Meltdowner was one of Academy City’s seven Level 5s and the head researcher who created her would know better than anyone how terrifying Mugino was.

Or was that knowledge the source of her confidence?

Did she know Mugino so well that she didn’t find the high-speed particle-wave cannon worth fearing?

“I-In the end, what do you mean she’s the head researcher?”

“Her name’s Ainame Caroline. She ran that lab until half a year ago. But while she was customizing a few other espers, ''she played around a little too much'' and got fired.”

“That’s not my point. In the end, she’s only a 10-year-old girl!”

Ainame Caroline didn’t respond.

Instead, her small body suddenly disappeared.

And a moment later…

“!!!???”

Sparks flew with a loud slicing sound. The club-like grenade Frenda had reflexively held up was sliced clean through and a red cut slashed across her cheek.

After passing by, the 10-year-old brown gyaru twirled her phone in the lukewarm rain.

“Sample acquired☆ Oh, lame. A Level 0? What a waste of time.”

(In the end, are the bunny ears of that phone case actually razor blades!?)

This girl couldn’t be dismissed as “only” a 10-year-old.

She was a true monster of the dark side, just like Item.

What kind of tech did that razor blade use to slice through a club? And the case itself appeared to be military-grade blast resistant. It could deliver a deep, sharp slash, but it could probably also kill from blunt trauma if she hit someone in the head with the corner.

Ainame Caroline laughed a little before speaking.

“Have you really not heard about skipping grades before? You crack me up. Hee ha ha. Not that you’d ever need to know that with your inferior Level 0 brain. When you look at the researchers creating something as crazy as a Level 5, I’d be surprised if you found anyone who climbed the grades one at a time.”

Even so…

What had that girl done to move so quickly not even these dark side pros could track her?

“…”

“Oh, and let’s not forget that all Level 5 research is somewhat connected. And I’m not just talking about the obvious example of Railgun and Meltdowner both being electric powers.”

Ainame Caroline was still smiling when she turned back around to face Mugino Shizuri.

“Did you really think the only Level 5 I had access to was a failure like you? That’d be so boring. I’m talking about Academy City’s #6. ''I was involved in researching that brat''. And as the creator of that power, I can borrow a few of its tricks.”

A sound like a large piece of cloth flapping in the wind came from overhead.

The color red flipped fluttered down.

At first, it looked like a red China dress.

But it wasn’t. The newcomer wore a uniform vest without a shirt below and a long skirt with a bold slit up the side, so the overall silhouette resembled the dress.

Her long black hair was done up in two buns and a braid.

The tall high school girl hid her lower face behind a large white pollen mask and she moved to a position that let her guard little Ainame Caroline.

No.

But…

(In the end, ''where did she jump in from''?)

Mugino Shizuri had destroyed the jungle gym of steel beams to get rid of the offroad truck pursuing them. There wasn’t anything high enough to jump down from in any direction.

Or were they supposed to believe she had flown through the air like a long throw in baseball?

How far would her body have to be modified to allow for that?

Or had she used an esper power?

Ainame Caroline reacted to her sudden rescue by pouting her lips in disappointment and munching on her chocolate snack stick

“Tachiuo-chan. Could you not show up when I didn’t ask for you?”

“But I was worried, Lady Carol.”

Muffled by the mask, her voice sounded like hard-to-make-out noise.

It also looked like she was going to suffocate with the mask so soaked with rain, but she didn’t seem to mind.

“And you need to ''stop telling them so much'' about the #6 and other stuff. Especially when they didn’t even ask.”

With a soft grunt of effort, the tall high school girl pulled a nearby steel beam out of the ground. More than that, she wrapped some nearby anti-bird spikes around the end. The end result looked a lot like a Chinese Lang Ya Bang, but it had to weigh more than 200kg. The original weapon would never weigh that much. She might as well be swinging around a weightlifting barbell.

But Ainame Caroline still gave her a cold look and brushed up her rain-wet blonde bangs.

“Lame. Talking tough won’t change that you’re a murder virgin. And if you’re so worried about data security, do better yourself. In a way, unreleased research results are more important than the researcher’s own life. Releasing those results at the coolest possible time is part of the researcher’s strategy, so they can’t have one of their own people letting it out early.”

“A-and, Lady Carol, your skirt is about to fall off.”

“Whoops.”

Just before one of the suspender snaps popped open from the little brown girl’s extreme motion, she managed to hold the soaked miniskirt in place with a hand. If the skirt needed the suspenders to stay up, then it had be a lot bigger around than she was. It seemed about right to hold the snack box against the side of her hip.

Mugino’s eyebrows twitched while the absorbed rain weighed down her negligee.

The 10-year-old head researcher smiled.

“Curious? About my researcher results, I mean. Not my underwear.”

“Not really.”

“Wow, lame! That obvious attempt to play it cool cracks me up!! Obviously a failure like you would be curious. Tachiuo Mary here is a success I can recommend to people with pride. If only I hadn’t been kicked out of that lab for going a little too far with my human experimentation. See, now I need to take back what’s mine to make the finishing touches to her body.”

Was that why this 10-year-old had used the anonymity of the internet to run marriage scams?

She was the head researcher who didn’t hesitate to call Mugino Shizuri – one of the seven Level 5s – a failure.

She was the monster who gotten herself fired by being too much even for a secret dark side lab.

And this Tachiuo Mary was her new creation.

It wasn’t known what exactly made this new girl rate higher than Mugino, but Mugino herself was willing to accept it as true.

She knew this Ainame Caroline was who she said she was. And she insisted that Tachiuo Mary was superior to Mugino.

Bluffing about that would be too risky.

“Uh, oh. In the end, we’re in serious trouble here!!”

“Don’t we just have to super beat up this new girl before those ‘finishing touches’ are done?”

Kinuhata and Frenda stepped forward before Mugino did. Tachiuo Mary was still incomplete, so if they teamed up on her and attacked from multiple angles at once, they might have a chance against her. In a way, that was the most direct tactic here.

But had they learned nothing from how they had ended up in this situation to begin with?

“Lame,” sighed the little brown gyaru.

Ainame Caroline simply raised her empty hand and snapped her fingers.

That really was all she did.

The flipped-over support organization 4-wheel-drive truck exploded.

The lukewarm summer rain was blown away.

Takitsubo reflexively tackled Frenda (who was highly flammable thanks to all her explosives) to the ground and Kinuhata guarded herself with Offense Armor but was still launched more than 3m straight up.

As for Mugino…

“You’re kidding…right?” said a dazed Frenda down on the ground.

She saw Mugino lying face down and unmoving on the ground now ruled by flame and smoke. That proud girl didn’t utter a single complaint as the mud soaked her hair and body.

She was unconscious.

A new chocolate snack stick wiggled in Ainame Caroline’s mouth as she laughed.

“Wow, lame. You really do put power over all else, don’t you? Your attack power leaves no room for complaint, but Meltdowner is so boring because that’s ''all'' it is. That wasn’t even an industrial explosive or a plastic explosive – it was a diesel fuel explosion. Sure, you can maybe keep the blast away with brute force, but did you forget to account for the rapid loss of oxygen from the flames? And you wonder why I call you a failure.”

Impossible.

That was Frenda and Kinuhata’s first thought after seeing the result.

They couldn’t accept that Mugino Shizuri of all people could be toyed with so easily.

And it still wasn’t over.

Was there no end to the threat presented by this Ainame Caroline?

“Oh, before I forget. You’re all focused on Tachiuo-chan here. Hee ha ha. But remember the cool attack that ''took out the brain'' of your driver? That wasn’t her – it was my power.”

“…”

“Did you think I wasn’t an esper just cause I’m a researcher? Lame. I’m a ''super cool researcher who can develop her own power however she likes''. Do you have the beginnings of a clue how much of a threat I am now? Ah ha ha. It cracks me up how slow your brains are☆”

“…………………………………………………………………………………”

Frenda couldn’t move.

She was soaked with rain and couldn’t even get up.

What could a Level 0 like her do against a monster like this?

How could she win even when working with a Level 4?

For one, she had just watched this enemy overturn the very foundation of Academy City’s level system by one-shotting a Level 5.

Plus, Takitsubo gave a warning while lying on top of her and holding her tight.

Ignoring a warning from Takitsubo’s formless sixth sense was guaranteed to end badly. Her past experience had taught her that all too well.

There was only one option left.

Frenda Seivelun instantly changed tack, pulling a stun grenade and smoke grenade from her kitty pajamas.

“Run away!!”

That was all they could do.

During the explosive flash of light and the thick wall of smoke, Frenda and Takitsubo took off running while covering for each other. Kinuhata hoisted unconscious Mugino onto her shoulders. Takitsubo’s hands wandered through empty space, but Frenda tugged on one hard. They didn’t have the luxury to collect the support organization delinquent who had been knocked out by a mystery attack. Frenda bit her lip at the decision, but they could not stay here any longer. Plus, a powerless Level 0 would only get herself crushed if she tried to drag along a boy who stood more than two heads taller than her. She could not be a hero here.

They were utterly defeated.

A thoroughly exasperated voice pursued Item’s fleeing backs.

The 10-year-old brown girl named Ainame Caroline had only one thing to say to them.

“''Lame''.”