Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:GT Volume2 Chapter2 (section)

===Part 3===

Shokuhou Misaki shuddered.

And she leaped behind cover as if a paralyzing curse had been lifted from her. She doubted the hip-height concrete barrier dividing the road from the café space could actually defend against Anna’s attack, but she wanted to avoid simply standing out in the open.

After all, Academy City’s #3 had been knocked out of the fight with the very first move.

More than anything Anna had done, Mikoto had been caught in the explosion of her own equipment and vanished into the bright flash of light, and Shokuhou could not spare the attention to try to figure out what had happened to her. If the other girl could no longer fight, that was that. And a psychological esper like Shokuhou could not hope to stick her hand into burning rocket fuel and drag someone out anyway.

Even from here, the heat felt like thin needles sticking into her body.

But she did not seem to be getting any warmth from that. The December chill remained, the snow stung as it hit her body, and that excessive heat was only doing more harm to the honey-blonde girl’s skin.

At the very least, the fire had not spread to the shops of this old(-looking) shopping district.

(I’m surprised I feel so betrayed by this. As much I’m loath to admit it, I must have been relying on Misaka-san more than I thought.)

But she still could not run away.

That boy would not last much longer if Anna was not defeated here. It was Shokuhou’s side that was in trouble if both sides lost sight of each other and wandered off into the city.

She forcibly stretched out her hand while crouched down with bent knees to grab at the chain of her bag full of remotes. She somehow managed to pull it over to her.

She heard a sound like thick rubber or leather stretching tight. It came from the suit between her two legs as her stretching to reach the bag put some kind of pressure on it.

She came to a stop as her thoughts were drawn to that part of her body. She had not thought too much about it before, but now she could not get her mind off of it. Was this an odd thing to think about given the circumstances? Yes, but she may have been trying to distract herself from the predicament she was in.

Mikoto’s nightmarish words replayed in her mind.

(It isn’t actually bulgy, is it?)

She looked down while crouching, but she could not tell from that angle. She knew this was not the time. She really did. But there were some things a girl just had to check on. She bit her lower lip and pulled out a forbidden item: a mirror.

(Hmm?)

The Queen was squirming behind cover while holding the small mirror up toward a fairly private location, but…

“Hey.”

“Hwaahhh!!!??”

“?”

The #5 Queen literally jumped when a casual voice spoke to her from beyond the concrete barrier.

Anna Sprengel’s usual all-knowing look had slipped as she stood there with her head tilted quizzically.

But the mirror was not what really mattered here. The other items in her bag were: the many remotes.

Shokuhou’s life was already at risk thanks to the enemy’s attacks and her own ally exploding, but she still pulled a TV remote out of the bag hanging from her shoulder. That item was the key to Academy City’s #5 power, Mental Out.

Her power had such broad applications that she had trouble using it properly without dividing it out and categorizing it.

Just as she aimed the remote and pressed the button with her thumb, Anna Sprengel’s head shook unnaturally, like it had been hit by an invisible bat from the side.

But…

“That will not work on me.”

“Eep!?”

(She recovered!? No, it didn’t take!!)

This was worse than with the #1 and #2 who she could control but she still had to keep her guard up around.

She had not expected her power to simply not work on someone. And not because they had forcibly deflected it with a solid defense like Misaka Mikoto did.

“You were mistaken to assume the supernatural ability to control people would allow you to comprehend my mental structure and take control. If you hope to grasp the mind of Anna Sprengel, you should have first trained yourself to the point that you can at least take control of an entire angel.”

Mental Out did not work.

Shokuhou’s power was strong, but ''it did not work at all against cats or dogs.''

And if her psychological power did not work on her enemy, her only remaining option was to use it on other people to gain more pawns. But doing that would only be sending innocent people to be slaughtered by Anna. That would leave a terrible taste in her mouth.

In fact, no one could stand up to this girl.

Even ''he'' had apparently been taken out with a single kiss attack.

That was why Shokuhou had not brought along any students with useful powers despite being the Queen of Tokiwadai’s largest clique. This was no longer about logic. The legend was crumbling. Not even Shokuhou Misaki was willing to carry the burden of someone else’s life when it came to fighting Anna.

In that sense, the only person she was comfortable with making use of here was that other girl.

(Speaking of which, what is that meathead doing? With our physical fighter down, even getting the ordinary people to safety is going to be tricky!)

She effectively had to do this without Mental Out. She was wearing the special equipment related to the Five Over, but the general athletic ability it provided her was still not enough to outdo Mikoto.

(And it’s worrying that Mitsuari-san never released the limiters on this suit during that ''other fight''. Dark side toys aren’t going to follow the safety standards, so I hope there isn’t a problem with this thing.)

With the #3 taken out in a single attack, Shokuhou did not see how she could escape defeat no matter how much she jumped and leaped around.

So she had to find some other way.

But what other way was there!?

“Now, what will it be this time?”

Shokuhou heard the sound of heavy metal grinding together.

Even with the snow falling on her through the broken arcade roof, Anna Sprengel had tossed aside the ordinary tree branch and started turning the wheel attached to the 2m orb.

A perfectly logical victory was not going to inspire any emotion inside her.

So she chose to laugh now that she had once more thrown some randomness into the battle.

That superhuman had reached the point that ''she enjoyed having Lady Luck abandon her. 

“If you don’t give up, you might just win eventually. But not because of anything you do—because my luck runs out. But if you don’t keep buying tickets, you can never win the lottery.”

“…!!!???”

With a dull thud, a complex arrangement of cracks ran through the orb and it opened up to reveal…

“Rope.”

Was that the tool she planned to use to take on one of the strongest forces in Academy City?

It was a perfectly ordinary piece of junk that looked so worn out it could snap at any moment, but Miss Sprengel hummed with the smile of a small child returning to their secret base and showing off the prize they had found on the ground.

There was no legend here.

It was really and truly a dud.

Yet she remained unchanged. The difference between her and her opponent was too overwhelmingly great. So much so that Anna herself seemed bored to death.

“So a question: what is this the world’s oldest form of?”