Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:Biohacker Chapter5 (section)

===Part 14===

Of course, even Kamijou Touma only had the one life. He did not have the guts to charge into the center of it all without a plan. That was why he had discussed it all with the three sisters first.

The Beginning Child always roared when using her power.

That meant it would not be all that difficult to take an action at the same time as her power activated. Just like swiping the mobile device from Mitsuari Ayu, they could stop her from activating her power.

The Beginning Child was not holding any kind of machine or tool.

So what did they need to obstruct her?

“Amazora!! Start firing those bullets wherever!!”

He was answered by a storm of earsplitting booms. That large-caliber Gatling gun could slice right through a tank if used right. Even if the storm of bullets never hit, the deluge of light and noise had enough power to pummel the body of whoever happened to be there.

And in fact, all the rustling from the surrounding area came to a stop. The birds in the branches, the beasts in the bushes, the bugs in the boughs, and all other forms of life fled in a panic from the sudden din and shockwaves.

The Beginning Child’s power remade her surroundings into the ideal environment for the living creature she designated.

But that magma and flood were clearly not the ideal for a human.

So how had she been switching between different effects before?

(She used the animals in the woods. The bat gave her a sulfur cave or volcano, the frog gave her the water, the rabbit gave her a tall mountain, and a mosquito or roach gave her a river of sludge. In each case, she remade the environment into the ideal form for the closest animal to her!!)

So they only had to remove all living creatures from her vicinity.

It was possible she could use herself as the basis for the environmental change, but creating the most comfortable world for a human would not be a threat to Kamijou. So they could eliminate all other options to create a situation where he could get close.

On the other hand, the category of “living things” was not limited to what they could see.

(She also created an icy world.)

Kamijou had a guess about that.

(I doubt that was using an escaped polar bear or penguin that belonged to Matsuo. But if she can use microscopic bacteria, that changes things. If her power works on living things at that size, she can create a world far removed from anything livable for humans!!)

“Rikuri, you’re up!!”

He heard a spinning motor that sounded a lot like an electric shaver.

A drone resembling a crane fly made of alloy and plastic flew 2 or 3 meters above the Beginning Child. It forcefully sprayed down a white mist that resembled the light shined down by a UFO. That spray contained a mixture of disinfectant and ethanol. It was harmless to people, but it would wipe out almost all microscopic bacteria.

They had eliminated all macroscopic animals and microscopic bacteria.

Now the Beginning Child was all alone.

Nevertheless, she spread the sleeves of her old-fashioned uniform along with her arms as he approached. She used all her inhaled oxygen to prepare for a roar.

She could still do it.

The human body contained gut bacteria. If she could expel any of that from her body, she might be able to select the living things on her skin or in her saliva as her target. If she created the environment ideal for those things, it was sure to be absurdly dangerous for humans.

She raised her hand toward her mouth and extended her tongue toward the back of her hand.

She was preparing to activate her power.

(I knew it wouldn’t be that easy!!)

Humans were capable of dissolving and absorbing the flesh they swallowed, so the environment meant for the microbes that lived there could be a lake of a digestive acid that dissolved all fat and protein in the area.

So.

Kamijou Touma had prepared a last resort.

“Kaibi!!”

The instant he shouted that name, something flew past his cheek from behind.

It was a hard and shiny mass about the size of his thumbnail.

The attack sliced through the air and toward the Beginning Child’s forehead. She reflexively caught it in her hand.

It was nothing more than a small beetle.

That nonlethal and unharmful attack fired by the girl in a dress’s handmade blowgun seemed more like a prank than anything, but it functioned as a decisive blow against the Beginning Child.

Because she would remake her surroundings based on the living thing closest to her.

“…!? ––––––!!”

She only seemed to notice after she had already carelessly roared.

What was the ideal environment for a small bug that loved flower nectar and hid on flower petals? Colorful flowers blossomed all around the girl in an old-fashioned hakama-style school uniform.

That was all.

There was no attack power there.

This may have been who the Beginning Child had originally been. If the people around her had not attached extra value to her power and pushed her away, she may have remained that way.

She had screwed up the setup all on her own herself once.

This was not Kamijou’s first time seeing this flower garden.

Another bug must have passed by closer than her intended target – for example, flying by right in front of her face – so she had unintentionally prioritized that and failed to remake her surroundings correctly.

And.

With that one attack neutralized, Kamijou Touma could rush toward her with nothing to stop him. He could move right up to her.

“Don’t worry.”

Her power would not have been some scary thing originally.

It created the best environment for a living thing. If that was all, it could be used to surround herself in a colorful flower garden.

“There’s nothing to worry about. I won’t let anyone use you for their own benefit. I won’t let them use you as a means to an end or to throw you at people as a weapon. So don’t worry. There’s nothing at all to worry about!!”

So this was not a failure on the Beginning Child’s part.

She needed to learn about this sort of success.

She should have been taught this sooner.

No matter how large and distorted it had grown, if Academy City wanted to call itself a school, someone should have taught her this.

But that could always begin now. He would not let anyone say it was too late.

No matter what.

“If…if you say there’s no place for you here and you say this is the only way you can create a place for yourself…”

This may have all been meaningless from the beginning.

This girl had done nothing worthy of blame.

But at this point, words alone could not stop her. So to grasp at a new starting point for her and to end things the way they were now, Kamijou Touma had no choice but to clench his fist tight.

When choosing between good or evil, he did not have to choose good.

He clenched his teeth to bear with the weight of that other option.

“Then I’ll destroy that idea!!!!!”

A single sound of impact followed.

He used no bullets or poison, making it an ending those assassin girls could not have provided.