Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:Item Chapter1 (section)

===Part 7===

Since she was outnumbered more than 10-to-1, Mugino Shizuri must have decided a lengthy battle would be a bad idea.

She suddenly produced a sharp flash of light and an explosive boom.

But that must have been a diversion. Someone made a move in the brief moment Kouzaku Mitori’s eyes and ears were overloaded. The silver dolls controlled by her Liquid Shadow could not think for themselves. She was essentially remote-controlling them with her power, so they would stand still if her thoughts ground to a halt.

Someone slipped between the many silver dolls and arrived right in front of the small girl.

“!!”

Kinuhata Saiai aimed for the center of Kouzaku Mitori’s chest with her fingers strengthened in some way. This attack was destructive enough to singlehandedly tear off a bulletproof luxury car’s door.

For a brief moment, the lovely girl’s eyes were muddied by red killer intent.

This meant her power was being boosted by thought processes taken from Academy City’s #1.

“''How bout I super tear away half your body weight with just the one hand''!?”

The impact made a high-pitched sound.

That meant it wasn’t a clean hit. Kouzaku Mitori had raised a pair of thick knives to catch Kinuhata Saiai’s palm.

Kouzaku Mitori laughed with her blades locked with the other girl’s fingers.

The immense pressure was bending the knives, but they were meant to be disposable anyway.

“Did you think my Liquid Shadow power was the only card in my deck?”

“''You sack of shit''!!”

“''Also,'' that 5-star super rare boost probably won’t do much good against me.”

Meanwhile, Kouzaku’s eyes were pitch black.

Her voice dropped another level while staring out with her deep, stagnant eyes.

“It’s based on those ranks the shady ''higher'' ups of this city decided on for themselves. Seeing people innocently believe in and use that hierarchy to decide how many rights people get ''makes'' me want to vomit.”

Her silver tail tore through the air. But instead of Kinuhata herself, it was aimed at the ground below her. No matter how thick Kinuhata’s nitrogen armor was, she would still fall if the road below her crumbled.

The tables quickly turned.

Kinuhata noted the vibration of the thick knives Kouzaku was placing her full body weight behind to hold back Kinuhata’s hand.

“''A frequency edge? Does making a T-shaped razor super vibrate like some kinda toy really accomplish much''?”

“Hee hee. Oh, this ''toy'' might be a little too exciting ''for'' you.”

That was when three or four spheres smaller than baseballs were thrown in from the side.

They were grenades sans pin.

“In the end, I’m trusting your power is thick enough, newbie!!”

Kouzaku didn’t even glance over as she used her silver tail to throw an equal number of knives. As soon as the knives stabbed into the grenades, causing them to hover for a moment, the timed fuses activated. The explosives detonated one after another from quite close by.

“Tch!! Didn’t get a critical…hit…!?”

Frenda’s words trailed off.

Something tore apart the dust cloud and flew her way. They were the very same throwing knives that had stopped the grenades – and so should have lost all speed and momentum. They didn’t even fly along straight lines. They followed blatantly unnatural curved paths before stabbing into Frenda’s arm and side.

Kouzaku whispered bewitchingly while using the knives in her hands to pin Kinuhata on her back.

These thick blades were not an esper power.

“''They’re called drone knives.''”

“Kah! In the end, how many tricks do you have up your sleeve!?”

Frenda cursed but focused on evasive action over stopping and removing the knives, proving she really was an experienced dark side member. The next pair of knives that flew in only managed to hit her shadow.

But that was fine.

The knives came to a stop only 3mm away from the ground and changed direction. With a sound like a firework going off, triple flames erupted from the base of the knives in a Y-shape, creating something like a guard for the blade. The blades spun around and blasted the rocket-like flames from their pommel to pursue their target anew. They had already been introduced as “drone knives”.

And if the drone knives could fly on their own…

“''Gut her''☆”

“Tch!!”

Something exploded.

Kouzaku Mitori was secretly impressed. With no time to stop and remove the blades, Frenda had applied a small quantity of explosive to the knives and detonated it to forcibly propel them out of her. If she hadn’t done that, the drone knives would have spun around while still stabbing into her body, but it still wasn’t something most people could decide to do on such short notice.

One after another, rockets blasted through the air. The girl was skillfully and admirably focused on killing. But Kouzaku detonated an explosive of her own she had earlier kicked underneath a black bulletproof car. That rolled the heavy vehicle over as a giant shield to block all of the rockets.

(And if worse came to worst, I could use these movable wings as a shield☆)

Kouzaku’s power was only specialized to create and control those dolls ''under special conditions''. But by using her own body as the base of her calculations, she could create the metal wings and tail as an extension of altering the details of the dolls.

(''Of course'', if I screw up my control, I could end up tearing away large pieces of my ''body'' with my own metal.)

The blonde girl was reliant on projectiles and it didn’t look like she could get back up and rejoin the fight right away.

Kouzaku was up against multiple opponents. There were still more people she wanted to stop while she had the chance. She could take her time and kill them all after she had them all down.

“Now, then.”

“!?”

Kinuhata Saiai was still just barely pushing back against the knives while fallen onto her back, but she was suddenly knocked to the side. A silver doll had kicked her in the side like she was a soccer ball.

“They have a relative ''density'' of about 20. The human body’s would be 1, just like water, so ''even'' these very sexy dolls weigh around a ton.”

“Bfh. Doesn’t that make the original weigh 50kg or so? That’s super heav-”

“I said ‘around’, you scrawny chicken carcass!”

That was about as heavyweight as you could get. It was like getting hit by a giant offroad vehicle. Kinuhata’s Offense Armor could stop a shotgun blast, but this had to be testing even its limits.

“Now for the next one.”

Several metallic crashes and clangs rang out.

Kouzaku had sent drone knives after a target other than Frenda, but they never hit Takitsubo Rikou. Kinuhata Saiai had blocked them with her body by forcing her way in their path on her unsteady legs.

…That kind of phony friendship pissed Kouzaku off.

These people were soaked in the dark side. They had killed and taken so much, but they had the nerve to declare themselves the single exception and take good care of their own family and friends?

Yes. That was how it worked, wasn’t it?

The grownup researchers who had taken away Kouzaku’s precious ■■■■■ would have gone home to their own partners and children at the end of the day. They knew what it meant to care for someone more than your own life, but they had no problem taking those kinds of people from others.

To them, clones and espers were no more than guinea pigs.

Kouzaku Mitori could not let them get away with it any longer.

She had become yet another drop in the sludge of the dark side she so loathed because it was the only way she could rebel. She was willing to kill if it would help her take down ''the ruler of this city''.

“Hm. I ''had'' a feeling the drone knives wouldn’t work ''against'' that air armor.”

“Super technically, it’s nitrogen.”

“I really ''don’t'' care. And since you ''bothered'' to protect her, I take it ''that'' useless one in the track suit is your leader? That tells me my ''best'' bet is to focus my attacks on her.”

She probably couldn’t defeat Kinuhata, but she could immobilize her by siccing the liquid metal dolls on her, releasing their shape, and trapping her inside a block of the metal.

Once that was done, Kouzaku could capture the track suit girl and either kill her right away or use her as a shield.

Kouzaku stepped over a bloody corpse and swung her silver tail.

“The legs? No, I want her to stand on her own, so that won’t ''work''. Okay, Miss Leader, I ''believe'' this is checkmate. I’ll start by taking your arms.”

“''You will, will you? I’m so sad you’ve completely forgotten about me.''”

There was a sizzling sound, immediately followed by a beam of light. A few more followed. That was enough to tear through the entire group of Liquid Shadow dolls. It didn’t matter that there were 50 of them.

Mugino Shizuri and her Meltdowner were one of Academy City’s seven Level 5s.

But that was irrelevant. Shoot them or blow them up, those dolls could regenerate. Or each of the scattered droplets could transform into a sharp needle that rushed toward Mugino.

Yet they didn’t regenerate.

Kouzaku tried to control the blasted silver droplets, but for some reason, her power couldn’t reach them.

It all splattered across the ground.

“Wha-!?”

“You don’t use just water or metal. You went out of your way to control something as unusual as liquid metal, which tells me your power can only control a very limited range of things. You said this was the product of high-level cushioning research, but it never caught on because a relative density of 20 was too heavy, right? I’m betting you can only control a specific metal molecule created in a factory somewhere.”

Mugino Shizuri gathered light in her palm and held it straight out.

She was ready to fire at any moment.

“Then all I have to do is provide a generous injection of electrons ''to change its molecular structure''. Ion manipulation isn’t all that difficult. Mixing in various impurities on the microscopic level will make your special metal a lot lighter. It’s like dropping your melty candy in the sandbox. With all that gross sand coating it, you can’t eat the treat your mommy gave you.”

“That’s not possible…”

“This is Academy City. Don’t stop thinking so soon. My power is known as the atom breaker, for crying out loud.”

She made it sound so obvious.

She wasn’t even trying to brag. She was just pissed that she was being asked to give a detailed explanation of why 1 plus 1 is 2.

“S-so ''what''?”

Kouzaku Mitori spread her arms wide.

Her metal wings did the same.

Her silver tail rose and she shouted with a bloody corpse lying at her feet.

“I still have ''plenty'' more weapons waiting for me at 10 thousand meters. I have a grand total of 1000 tons! If I send it all down and make dolls from it, we’ll have a real war on our hands!!”

A scratchy groan came from Frenda who was collapsed bloody on the ground. That had to be more than 100 large dump trucks’ worth. A girl weighed around 50kg with a relative density of 1 and that metal had a relative density of 20. That meant the total amount could create 1000 dolls.

“Quadruple digits? What the hell? In the end, how many secret weapons do you have!?”

“Not even an army of thousands is ''enough'' if I really want to bring down that goddamn Windowless Building.”

A deep, muddy darkness could be seen in Kouzaku Mitori’s eyes.

“But they have other uses. High-Level espers always ''have'' to play alone, so I’ll show ''you'' what a real war is like. I can defeat anyone ''if'' I crush them with ''superior'' numbers!!”

“Oh, really?” Mugino Shizuri grinned. “There’s more to Item than me. We’re a team and we work together.”

That was when something stabbed Kouzaku Mitori in the flank.

The corpse at her feet had stood up.

No, ''Hanano Choubi had been lying face down covered in blood,'' but she had grabbed one of the fallen drone knives and tackled Kouzaku.

From close range and with no mercy.

She supposedly specialized in disguise and infiltration. The voice on the phone had called her “a real prize”, so her skill had to be real. When she decided to attack, Kouzaku didn’t have time to react with arm, leg, wing, or tail.

“Gah?”

“I’m not the only one sad I’d been completely forgotten,” said Mugino Shizuri with a savage smile.

She did not overlook the moment her opponent was immobilized.

“And we fight as a team!!”

She sent out another Meltdowner blast from dead ahead.

Time seemed to resume flowing all at once.

Something exploded.

The scattered silver droplets became silver arrows and tore through the dust cloud as they flew horizontally toward Mugino.

“Tch!!”

Mugino evaded to the side and fired more Meltdowner blasts, but to no avail.

The inability to focus on offense hurt her a fair bit.

“Wah, yikes, eek!! I’m here too! Please don’t shoot meeeee!?”

Hanano covered her head with her hands and curled up like a small animal, but that was all Mugino could see. The gloomy black-haired devil girl was nowhere to be found beyond the shredded dust cloud.

She had probably sacrificed her wings or tail to create that scattershot so she could escape.

“God, so she detonated her own stuff? She’s really thought her power through.”

Kouzaku had shown a familiarity with using her power to attack and to withdraw. When fighting alone, you had to deal with all your mistakes yourself, so securing an escape route was more important than gambling on a method of defeating the enemy.

The dolls spread across the area lost their shape and splashed down into silver puddles. Kouzaku must have severed her power’s control. That meant the battle was over.

Mugino roughly mussed up her hair with a hand.

“With that done…Hanano!!”

“Y-yesh!? Wha-what do you want!? D-did I do something that upset you and all your terrifying power!?”

“Upset me? That was a well-played attack. You got her good.”

The nervous girl stared blankly for a moment.

But her face finally seemed to melt.

“Heh…heh heh☆”

“Mugino.”

Takitsubo Rikou approached Mugino.

She shook a small case.

“''Should I use Body Crystal?''”

“Hmm.”

Mugino crossed her arms and looked up.

That girl had claimed to have had 1000 tons waiting at 10 thousand meters. Those were absurd numbers, but a military bomber was more than 200 tons when empty, which meant it wasn’t that much different from a formation of bombers flying on a mission. Assuming that wasn’t just a bluff, that girl could have covered every centimeter of the area with a downpour of metal arrows, but some time had passed and there was no sign of it. She must have truly run away.

She had wanted some information from a “bad grownup” so she could attack the Windowless Building.

Assuming that was true, it didn’t necessarily have to be the insurance company’s general manager. If things weren’t looking good, she could stage a hasty retreat and make use of another immoral VIP who had the information she needed.

After some thought, Mugino made her decision.

“No need. We wouldn’t make any money pursuing her.”

“(In the end, there would’ve been no stopping Mugino if she got mad. I’m so glad that bloodthirsty and immature old hag managed to keep her cool this time.)”

“Frenda, if you have something to say, you’ll need to speak up. But anyway, we need to deal with that general manager.”

“E-eek!?”

All alone now, the old man had fallen on his rear.

When one person had the fortune of escaping, someone else would be stuck with an equal amount of misfortune.

Unfortunately, that was how the dark side worked.