Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:GT Volume1 Chapter1 (section)

===Between the Lines 2===

That was a ''windowless room''.

Simply not being able to see outside was enough to make the place feel cut off from the normal flow of time. No one shown the inside of that room could have guessed it was currently December 24. In fact, they could not have said whether it was summer or winter, day or night.

Yet a monster had chosen to place himself there.

He was the true #1 who overwhelmed even the other Level 5s within Academy City.

Yet he had also claimed the power of Board Chairman as his own.

“Ironic, isn’t it?” scoffed the white monster.

But his scorn was directed not at Yomikawa, but at himself.

Thinking back, he had always been this kind of person. Everyone had looked up to him as the strongest and he had reigned at the top as a target of fear, yet his heart had always been ruled by alienation and self-loathing. That may have been why that ''small girl'' had latched onto him like that. The pair could seem strange, but it had probably been the most natural thing in the world for them.

That girl was not here.

There was no airflow in here. Only an oppressive sense of imprisonment.

In other words…

“I really do have the entire world in my grasp, yet I chose to entomb myself here. Maybe humans have a tendency to retreat from freedom the more of it they have.”

Yomikawa Aiho, who had been “allowed” to sit in the seat across from him, had been speaking with that monster for a little bit now. It had not been long, but now was not the time to let that bother her. In fact, it was scary she had been allowed even this. Her expression was far from bright. The words of the Board Chairman would directly influence the fates of Academy City’s 2.3 million people and it would shake the lives of the more than 7 billion people reliant on science and technology.

There were no absolute correct answers in the world of technology.

For example, it was perfectly fine to loathe microplastics that would never decompose, but mass-producing exactly as many paper straws and cups would wipe out the Amazon rainforest in no time at all. Doing what was considered “right” would not necessarily lead to the future you wanted. The world would grow distorted. One careless statement from the new Board Chairman could change the course of history. It could easily redirect the entire world from right to left. And that course might bring them to a sea choked with plastic or continents dried out into deserts. And just as doing what was right would not necessarily lead to the future you wanted, avoiding the mistakes before your eyes would not necessarily lead to a future devoid of mistakes.

Yomikawa Aiho was speaking with someone who controlled the world.

Like it or not, she was participating in a game of the gods.

No more crime, no more disease, no more accidents, no more natural disasters, no more wars, and no more tragedies.

Everyone could come up with those sayings, but if you actually said them here, who would the monster target next and how would it influence the rest of the world out there? She had to consider those matters. Now that she was seated here, she could not claim ignorance.

This was not an issue of selecting a card from a predetermined deck.

If she was going to guide this new Board Chairman, she would have to make him come up with a brand new option not already on the table.

And in that sense…

(His choice is certainly an impressive one.)

“Are you really sure about this?” she asked.

“About what?”

“I really think there had to be other options. This might be the right thing to do, but you’re clearly accepting some tragedy here.”

“Don’t make me laugh.”

“I wasn’t delighted to hear about it, I can tell you that!”

“Then what are you gonna do about it?”

The monster smiled a little.

His lips silently split part and spread into a crescent moon shape.

“Are you going to stop me? As a special kindness, I’m willing to set aside all of my grownup authority. But what can you do after descending to the world of us kids?”

“…”

“Do you get it now? I’m sure you did from the beginning. You aren’t afraid of the title of Board Chairman, but you aren’t scared of the Academy City’s #1 moniker either. …You already know that this is the ''right'' choice. You know you can’t argue otherwise, so you can’t grab at my collar to lecture at me or whatever. And that’s fine. That puny pride is a virtue. You can’t bring yourself to throw a tantrum in front of a kid, right? You’re far better than those Kiharas and others like them.”

“But!!”

“Let’s get ambitious, shall we?”

These were the juvenile but cruel words of the child created by the adults.

It was almost like losing control of the satellite they had launched and having it fall down on their heads. And since that satellite had been made with the best of humanity’s technology, it was loaded with a dangerous reactor meant for use in outer space that used sodium cooling and deuterium.

Yomikawa felt like “just deserts” may be the best term for this.

But whose just deserts?

“Think through all the annoying little details like you’re a goddamn Board Chairman yourself. You adults have messed with my brain so much for your own purposes, so now that you’ve dumped all this authority in my lap, I hope you’re ready. Because it’s my turn now. You’ve got no right to complain if I use this clever brain you’ve given me to utilize this new power to its fullest.”

“…”

“I gave you plenty of time, so I’m sure you’ve got everything set up. I know you wouldn’t have shown your face here otherwise. I’m not here to pester you about your progress, so hurry up and tell me everything is in place. That’s why I called you here. I knew you were the best one for the job.”

Yomikawa Aiho gently clenched her teeth.

“This will change everything.”

“It will.”

“Not just for the kids in this city. This choice you’ve made all on your own will affect the fate of this entire planet of 7 billion people!!”

“It wouldn’t be worth doing otherwise.”

He knew full well what he was doing.

Yomikawa Aiho was part of Anti-Skill, so she was meant to protect the children of Academy City. If dragging that white monster to the floor and putting him in an armlock would stop this snowball from rolling down the hill, she would have done so without hesitation. This was the #1 who was far more powerful than the #3 Railgun who could create and control currents of more than a billion volts or the #5 Mental Out who could control people’s minds. ''She knew exactly what his fearsome power was'', but she still would have grabbed him with her bare hands. But she understood that doing that would not stop what he had started.

That would not protect anyone.

It did not take a genius to understand it, but saving people was not that simple.

“The trigger is ready to be pulled, isn’t it?”

“…”

“I’m saying I want you in charge of this. But if you won’t do it, I’ll just get someone else. Will you be a part of the world’s conclusion, or won’t you? Choose. Which will it be?”

When it came down to it, Yomikawa Aiho was only a teacher and this was the new Board Chairman who held authority over them all.

No matter what they had once been for each other, that was now an unavoidable fact.

She felt ashamed

She spat out one last thing while powerless to do anything more.

“You’ve changed.”

“And you’re one of the ones who changed me.”

It had already begun below the surface.

The ''plan'' of this new era was known as Operation Handcuffs.

<noinclude>
{{Toaru_Nav|prev=Toaru_Majutsu_no_Index:GT_Volume1_Prologue|next=Toaru_Majutsu_no_Index:GT_Volume1_Chapter2}}
</noinclude>