Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:GT Volume15 Chapter4 (section)

===Part 7===

The tremendous acceleration weighed on Hamazura Shiage’s insides.

They had taken off.

(What kind of tunnels was that underground area connected to!?)

“Ane…ri… What are this thing’s specs!?”

All sorts of data appeared on the cracked screen.

The Jumbo Dragonfly took off from the ground by using a runway and gradually gaining altitude, much like an airplane.

But after stabilizing its flight, it would raise its nose to nearly vertical and accelerate. After nearly reaching the limits of an aircraft at an altitude of 30 thousand meters, the spaceship at the very front would separate from the rest. The bullet-shaped module would use its momentum to soar through the atmosphere and reach an altitude of 400km, which was known as low Earth orbit.

…As that explanation suggests, this was a civilian use of a satellite killer project that would launch a missile from a supersonic aircraft to blow up an enemy’s military satellite.

There were sturdy airtight doors between cabins to ensure no oxygen could escape in an emergency, but those were slowly opening from the outside.

And from the back of the long, narrow space…

Kamijou Touma emerged.

Hamazura was exposed to a crushing g-force that was clearly greater than Earth’s natural gravity, but a different question occupied his thoughts.

“Wait. How did he mess with the computers without an AI supporting him?”

If he had something equivalent to Aneri, what was it? After all, this spaceship tearing through the atmosphere was a collection of computers. Anything could become a weapon if operated incorrectly.

Hamazura raised his guard, but then it hit him.

“No, it wasn’t necessarily him!! ''The base’s infrastructure would activate if anyone in the base hit the switch''. It could have been Birdway or Fortune that helped him!”

Didn’t that mean that shifting the fight to the Jumbo Dragonfly was actually a bad thing for Kamijou? Then why do it? It wasn’t like Hamazura had been hiding Aneri’s presence.

No…

No!?

This situation did help Kamijou!!

(So that’s it…)

Hamazura belatedly realized Kamijou’s aim here.

But it was too late to do anything about it.

(If we leave the Earth in a spaceship with a broken antenna, Aneri will be cut off from everything on the surface. Is he trying to ''downgrade'' Aneri to no more than a smartphone!?)

“Aneri, answer me. Can you keep going!?”

He received an immediate buzz in response, but it wasn’t promising.

There was no next action – like “G→→PKT” – displayed on the screen. Even in Academy City, a single phone just didn’t have the processing power.

Meanwhile, he was up against Kamijou Touma and whatever it was that rivaled Aneri.

The situation had been completely reversed from when the fight began.

…So would Hamazura raise the white flag and return to the peaceful world that was glad Coronzon had died? Unharmed and with a silly grin on his face? Sucking up to their righteousness so they would share some of their happiness with him?

“''Immediately open all the spaceship’s doors, Aneri!! I don’t care what happens as long as I can kill him!!!''”

Aneri refused with two buzzes.

The AI’s victory condition was defined as Hamazura Shiage’s survival, not Kamijou Touma’s death. The damn thing had changed that setting on its own!!

(That means I can’t get Aneri to blow the spaceship away with the laser or mass driver back on the surface either!!)

Having that “insurance” in his back pocket just in case would help mentally bolster him, but the AI must not have understood that kind of ''abstract'' subtlety.

And his enemy wasn’t going to wait.

That “just in case” moment had arrived. That monster drenched in justice was coming this way!!