Toaru Majutsu no Index:GT Volume1 Chapter1
Chapter 1: Just Like an Amusement Park – Red_Wear,Big_Bag,and_Flying_Sledge.
Part 1
He so wanted it to be a dream.
But his sleep-deprived mind and aching muscles told him the events of the previous night had been all too real.
“Such misfortune,” muttered Kamijou Touma in his student dorm room.
His phone was propped up on the glass table using a stand and its power cable was plugged in. It was invisibly linked to the room’s TV with a short-range wireless connection, so the phone’s display was transferred to the large LCD screen.
He was in the middle of a video chat.
This month’s data limit was being rapidly chewed through in order to display Tsukuyomi Komoe, a 135cm and pink-haired teacher who was full of mysteries. And given the date, she was wearing a miniskirt Santa outfit. She apparently liked to dress up for special occasions much like the top page of a search engine.
“Okay, it’s time for one of my special makeup lessons since Kamijou-chan here has missed far too many days of class.”
Her voice was as sweet as candy, but there was a hint of poison mixed in. Her perfect smile scared him. The 24th was part of winter break, so this was supposed to be a precious holiday for students and teachers alike. She was giving off an aura. Her anger and resentment over him ruining her holiday seemed to waft from her body like a dark perfume.
“If it was too much trouble to get us both at school for this, why even bother with the makeup lesson?”
“Because without this lesson, you would have to repeat your first year again. But if that is what you want, so be it. So, um, what will it be? If you do go for a second round, you should be able to live the life of an overpowered MC who has seen it all before.”
“Makeup lesson please!! I know full well the ‘overpowered’ life of repeating a year will be nothing so nice! Everyone else in the class is bound to just keep their distance!!”
Thus, he had to spend his holiday studying. Academy City was indeed a city of schools. They did things very differently from an ordinary shopping district where a couple would enter the karaoke box and excitedly discuss whether to choose the fake nose glasses or the cat ears headband for the optional joke product that came with the room rental.
He wanted to live that life. Was he allowed to wish for something like that?
“Academy City’s esper powers have a foundation in quantum physics. Quantum physics is useful in describing the behavior of subatomic particles like protons and electrons as well as the four fundamental forces of the strong force, the weak force, gravity, and electromagnetism, but you will almost certainly never be aware of the changes caused by the observations you make in an ordinary life. You can’t make an apple disappear by willing it to disappear, after all. You can think of those changes like imaginary numbers – they are necessary to explain the way the world works, but you are never really aware of them. Normally, anyway.”
She had complained about having to give this makeup lesson, but once she got going, she proved herself to be a true teacher.
Her words flowed smoothly, but she changed her intonation on the important terms so they would stick out in Kamijou’s mind.
That made it easy to take notes and mark up his text with a highlighter. That provided an odd sense of accomplishment, so it was a lot like working out the structure of a dungeon in an RPG that required manually drawing out the map.
Of course, this was not unique to this special Christmas Eve lesson. Komoe-sensei must have always taught like this in the classroom, so the horrific state of Kamijou Touma’s attendance record could be seen in how he was only really noticing it now.
“Academy City’s espers forcibly alter this to draw out phenomena that cannot be explained with Newtonian physics. In other words, supernatural phenomena. Drugs, electricity, suggestion, and other methods are used to distort how people perceive the world and that forces them to make observations outside of the norm. By bringing that from the microscopic and up to the macro world, we make esper powers a reality. Ksh.”
“Hm? Komoe-sensei???”
The footage had grown pixelated for a moment there.
Kamijou had a bad feeling about this and called out to her, but the Santa costumed teacher did not seem to mind. Or had his voice not reached her?
“The filter used to – ksh – distort the esper’s perception is known as their Personal Reality, but those are all unique and no two people have the exact same one. Ksshh. That is one of the tricky aspects of esper development. Ksshh!! But don’t worry! There is no such thing as wasted effort!! You might be ranked as a Level 0 for now, Kamijou-chan – ksshh!? – but if you work at your strong points, you will surely- kssshhh!!”
“Wait, wait, wait! What is going on!? Ahhh!”
Kamijou Touma screamed.
The footage on the TV entirely froze for a few seconds and then it transformed into a bunch of white alphanumeric text on a black background. A bunch of incomprehensible English text was followed by a countdown. He apparently had to select an option and he was given 10 seconds to do so.
But this was new.
Computers were one thing, but he had not known that phone OSs had crash screens. He knew the hardware was fragile, especially the LCD screen that was easily broken, but he had thought the software was fairly robust and it would only reboot quickly if it ran into trouble. It felt like seeing your usually reliable dorm manager laid up in bed after coming down with a cold. It was actually kind of adorable.
Also, the phone’s crash screen was not the well-known blue one. To reiterate, it was black. Why was she trying to be so stylish during an emergency like this? Was she dressing up somewhere she thought no one would ever see? It was a lot like deciding to help out by washing off the dorm manager’s sweat and accidentally seeing some shocking underwear. It was awkward. M-miss manager!! I thought you were more the kind and gentle type!!
“…”
Ten seconds passed while Kamijou used those ridiculous thoughts to avoid facing the reality before him. The TV and his phone had both gone dark and refused to do anything.
It felt like some kind of punishment.
Did cutting-edge phone OSs dislike wishy-washy guys? Had that kind and gentle dorm manager (who could not hide the sexy allure hidden below the surface) finally grown fed up with him? If so, his life truly was devoid of hope.
“Umm.”
He had no idea what to do.
So he called out to the girl playing with a calico cat in a corner of the room.
“Index, how about we head out for a bit?”
Part 2
There was a girl known as Index.
Strictly speaking, her name was Index Librorum Prohibitorum.
At first glance, she looked like a small girl with a childish build, long silver hair, and a white nun’s habit, but she was actually a strange person who worked as a grimoire library by memorizing at least 103,001 grimoires. She belonged to Necessarius, the 0th Parish of the Anglican Church. You might be wondering what that is, but that sort of thing apparently existed in the wide world beyond Academy City’s walls.
That is, magic.
That other supernatural power stood opposite of the esper powers that Academy City had introduced to the world using science.
“Christmastime♪ It’s Christmastime♪”
The clear winter sky meant it was cold enough for a lot of the previous day’s snow to remain on the ground, but the girl in question was smiling and singing to herself with the calico cat riding on her white hood. She had come here from England, but this song was in Japanese. Kamijou had no idea where she had picked it up from. Since she had a perfect memory, she could accurately memorize it all by overhearing it for a moment as the in-store music being played in an electronics store shown on TV.
Incidentally, someone who had mastered all forms of magic was known as a Magic God.
And there was apparently a risk of someone turning into one of those if they used all of the grimoires contained in her head.
“Hm, hm, hmm♪ Hydrogen♪ And helium♪”
“Wait, Index. What happened to Christmastime?”
(Damn, I managed to restart my phone by holding down that weird button for a bit, but it won’t connect to Komoe-sensei. What is causing this!? Is one of our devices busted!?)
“Listen, Index. We need to stop by Komoe-sensei’s place first. I need to meet that goddamn teacher in person and figure out what happened to my makeup lesson. Because this is a crucial issue that could get me held back.”
“Touma, let’s buy a turkey!! It’s fascinating how they’re selling them on the roadside!!”
“Are you even listening!? And those aren’t like cakes. I mean, doesn’t it scare you how cheap they are? Are those turkeys they sell at discount stores even real? They can design how meats look in the factory, right!? Convenience stores even sell these mysterious salad chickens that have all the bones removed and are shaped like gold bars. Those supposed turkeys might use some other kind of meat altogether, like how the negitoro at a conveyer belt sushi place might actually be moonfish.”
If Kamijou Touma of all people was afraid of how cheap something was, you knew it had to be bad. After all, this was the king of thrift! When his finances were in dire straits, he would start to have some dangerous thoughts: “If you stick a bunch of eggshells in the blender, could you eat them? Hey, I bet it wouldn’t kill you at least!!” The Christmas sales wars were built from love, desire, and mistrust. Just like the products bought at a global soccer tournament, the items making the city shine so bright would leave you wondering “what is this and why did I buy it?” just one day later.
Some elementary school girls were making a fuss in front of a store.
“Nyah!? They have a Santa catching kit!! Wh-when did Academy City invent this?”
“D-don’t buy that, Fremea-chan. That’s definitely a normal bug-catching net they couldn’t sell during the summer or even autumn.”
“Mister, I want one of these! I’ll pay using my phone – kaching!!”
“Ahh! How are you going to lure Santa in with sap jelly!?”
It was scary how wide a variety of joke products existed (most of which only added the “joke” so they could get away with it not actually working). Some would view it as a standard part of the season, while others would see it as a cruel scam targeted at children. It was similar to temple festival sharpshooting games in that sense.
But now was not the time to indulge in any of that.
Not until he knew what had become of his makeup lesson after his phone had frozen up!! That tiny teacher might as well be a doctor who wandered out of the OR and left on vacation while my stomach is still sliced open for an operation!! groaned Kamijou Touma while gnashing his teeth.
(Damn. My phone rebooted like normal but I still can’t connect, so the trouble has to be on her end. If an error on her part nearly corrupted my phone’s data, I need to get an apology out of her. And I need to avoid being held back. Even if it means blackmailing her!!)
He made a quick search on his still-functioning phone and saw no sign of other people having similar trouble.
The screen on the airship floating in the blue sky said nothing about a widespread communications disruption.
It scared him to think this was happening to him and only him. If he had been infected by something no one else had ever heard of, wouldn’t it slip right past his phone’s security?
(Please let her device be entirely busted!!)
He did not want to spend his Christmas Eve going on the journey of a clean install in order to troubleshoot his phone. Plus, he had no idea how to even do that with a phone as opposed to a computer. The ordinary factory reset mentioned on one corner of the settings screen probably would not cut it there. But what else was there? What was he supposed to do!? A sudden malfunction in the mobile device he always used brought nothing but unease. Please get better soon, you kind and beautiful dorm manager!!
(A-anyway, one thing at a time. I need to start with the solution I can try by just walking there.)
He was pretty sure Komoe-sensei lived in an apartment in Academy City’s District 7.
It was a two-story building with the stairs and passageways on the outside. More than that, the two-part washing machine was kept outside as well. Tsukuyomi Komoe, that 135cm teacher from a fantasy world, lived in that divine realm where only Showa-era manga artists and ronin students were allowed.
Kamijou walked up to the door that looked so thin his fist would break through if he knocked on it and he pressed the doorbell. But he heard no bell. Either the battery or the wiring was out. He had no choice but to rap his fist against the thin door.
“Excuse me, miss!! Would you care for a newspaper!? Buy now and it comes with two boxes of detergent!!” His random choice of words received no response.
…
He had a bad feeling about this.
The door had a newspaper slot, so he brushed aside the entire concept of privacy by crouching down and opening the wide slot with his fingertips. There was no lucky pervert moment here. Not only was she not changing within, but he only found a dreary space where time seemed to have stopped.
(Don’t tell me.)
The neighbor’s door opened.
The woman who stepped out wore a red track suit, a thick coat that looked like it was made out of a futon, and spiral glasses. Since she was living in this apartment and dressed like that, Kamijou decided she was only allowed to be a manga artist.
“Um, my neighbor left to go somewhere three days ago. She asked me to collect her mail for her.”
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
He was pretty sure he remained frozen for 5 full seconds.
And then the pointy-haired boy screamed at the top of his lungs.
Tsukuyomi Komoe held his fate in her hands, yet she had gone missing. That teacher had been using her Santa costume and communication device to give him a remote lesson from wherever she had gone. That explained why she had been so reluctant to hold the makeup lesson at school. Plus, her neighbor had said she went “somewhere”. That meant the woman did not know where and he would receive no further hints here. He did not even know if she was still inside Academy City, so this would be far too difficult a search for him.
The woman in a track suit, coat, and spiral glasses was not the type to care about other people’s pain.
“Oh, whoops. I need to get back to day trading. With the big and bizarre wave of Christmastime in full force, I can’t keep my eyes off the screen for a moment. I can rest once I sell off all my stocks and can watch the last trading day of the year end with a smile on my face! Bye!!”
“How dare you dress like that when you’re rich!!”
She ignored him and shut the door. This place had to have incredibly low rent, so did she rent it out as a workplace separate from her actual home?
But now was not the time to be bothered by that unknown woman’s lifestyle.
Winter truly had arrived for Kamijou Touma.
And this winter was as barren as a nuclear winter.
“Touma, I’m hungry.”
“Yeah, probably so.”
He turned around with awfully slow movements.
He had a smile of shadows on his face.
Laughter may have been the last resort of the lonely person who had been abandoned by the world itself.
A great demon king had appeared in the modern world.
“Mwa ha ha ha ha!! I don’t care! Why should I even care anymore!! Fine, let’s spend the 24th enjoying ourselves! Ha ha, ah ha ha! I mean, if the problem is with the adults’ system, then I’m not at fault!!!!!! Hah hah hah! Gwa ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!”
No, pointy-haired one.
That right there is known as crying.
Part 3
He had a chance.
The error causing that awfully stylish crash screen really had happened, so wherever it was stored and whatever had actually happened, there had to be a record of the error within his phone. He had tried his damnedest to take that makeup lesson, but the infrastructure prepared for him had malfunctioned. The dorm manager’s unseen black underwear was all the proof he needed of that. So there was no conflict here! He was fine!! He wouldn’t be held back!! If the 24th was going to put up anymore of a fight, he would summon the spirit of a middle-aged woman hidden deep within his heart and make a verbal barrage of arguments in his defense. Kamijou Touma had traveled through many a country and region with Japanese as his only language, so he had already proven how strong he was when he gave up.
That was why he had confidence in his voice when he next spoke.
But it was strange. He was super happy on the inside, yet the asphalt ground kept shifting around like it was made of cotton candy.
“Where should we go?”
“Somewhere with lots of lights!!”
It was a miracle that Index had not started listing off different foods. Christmas Eve was a truly devilish time. It was full of unpredictable things which could even be called little miracles. He was pretty sure Christmas was supposed to be the birthday of some important person or another, so was it really okay for it to be such a devilish time of year?
But anyway.
District 6 had been made into one giant amusement park, but visiting any of those crowded tourist destinations without a reservation would be a hellish experience. There was no need to crawl under a rock and hide on a day like this, but it would still be safer to go with a place that did not need tickets and had no lines.
“So instead of going somewhere special, let’s check out the usual places in District 7. Nothing could show off the Christmas spirit more.”
“Why?”
“Because all the lights and decorations will be more noticeable when you know what it usually looks like.”
High schoolers had to keep up appearances and maintain their pride, so when they gave a plausible sounding reason for something, they were oftentimes hiding their real reasons. In this case, he was too afraid to go anywhere near the fashionable shopping district of District 15. Those areas had a high enough difficulty setting already, but go there at Christmas, Halloween, or Valentine’s and there would be a strange event boost to that setting, making it entirely unbalanced. He could already imagine himself being torn to pieces like the poor fool who accidentally ran across the event boss battle in an online game!! But there is nothing to be ashamed of, Kamijou Touma told himself. After all, he was in the right here. The people boldly walking through those areas on Christmas Eve were decked out in the real-life equivalent of pay-to-win equipment (brand-name bags, fur coats, and the like), so he never had a chance! Competing with them was a lost cause!! If only their leather and fur products would all turn to cheap plastic!!
“Touma, why do I see a deep shadow in your smile?”
“No reason. There’s nothing weird about me, Index.”
It was Christmas Eve, so Kamijou did not want to feel like he should never have left the home he had made for himself by chewing through a rotted fallen tree, so he focused on the things he could actually manage. Spending Christmas close to home was fine. Walking around outside with a friend was plenty fun.
They could enjoy themselves seeing how different the city looked with all the decorations.
That told him where they would be going. The ordinary homes decorated with all sorts of lights for this one day only were as laughable as those decotora (←which one is that an insult to?), but the more populated areas would still be the most decorated. They made their way to the train station area for now.
The cables of decorative lights had not been attached to the wind turbine blades. It was pretty cold, but they were going strong and had not frozen. Their surface was glittering from water droplets covering them, so they may have been installed with heating elements to melt the snow. Someone had even placed a bike’s chain lock on the support pillar in place of a Christmas wreath.
A truck passed them by and they looked over to see an advertisement vehicle that was really just a truck carrying a big LCD screen that generally played ads.
This one was playing the news.
“Who wants to try a custom donut decorated with cream!? Here in New York, these sweets are all the rage instead of cakes. With the spread of the nuclear family, an entire cake provides far more than the ideal calories per person, so this practice was started by the doctors who look after the wealthy residents of Beverly Hills. Even US President Roberto Katze joined in on social media by…”
“Go to hell!! Don’t force your fancy private lives on us from across the Pacific! If you’re that worried about calories, then go gnaw on some wax food samples!! You know what happens when you truly cut all the calories out of your food!? You starve to death!!”
“Touma, you’re scaring me. …Evil multitude known as Legion, I cast thee into those beasts and send you running from the cliff!”
Index clasped her hands together and began muttering some kind of ward against evil, but unfortunately, Kamijou was not possessed by anything evil. How unscientific. Let us ignore the fact that behaving like this while in control of himself was far more concerning than any occult explanation.
But once they arrived near the station, they found some strange lines had formed.
They were everywhere.
There had been signs of the fad before winter break, but this was something else entirely.
At some point, a bunch of similar-looking donut stands had multiplied like an amoeba monster. The entire donut was soaked in a sweet and gooey pudding-like substance to soften it up like a bavarois, then cream, colorful chocolate powder, and colorful syrups were used to decorate it however the customer asked for it. And how did the customers ask for it? If you guessed anything related to the flavor, you are truly naïve. They asked for it however would look best on social media!!
Also, something had gone wrong during the game of telephone as the fad crossed the Pacific because these had aspects not seen in the original. This country was quick to adopt new things but never cared much about getting the particulars right.
(Is that really safe? I’ve heard the decorations are based on your birthdate, blood type, lucky color, and so on, so can’t people work out your personal information if you post pictures of that online?)
Also, why did people think luck and colors had anything to do with each other?
If something like that could create a significant shift in the probability and statistical data, then he doubted Academy City’s quantum-based esper powers development would have been necessary in the first place.
Also, could you really call something a donut when you couldn’t carry it around with you?
The donut was placed on a small paper plate and lots of cream was piled on top. They ended up looking like palm-sized wedding cakes and couples were happily gathered around them and using their phones to take plenty of pictures of those donuts colored with a toxic mixture of sky blue and pink. Some even had sparking fireworks sticking into them.
Since the photos were the main point, the couples would flirt with each other over who would eat it and try to push it into each other’s mouth. They had spent so much time waiting in line to buy it, yet eating it was being treated like a punishment. This was making Marie Antoinette look reasonable. At some point, people had entirely forgotten that food should not be wasted. Kamijou Touma wondered why these people were not being struck by lightning. These thoughts of his might be shockingly extreme, but the spirit of a middle-aged woman was rising up within his heart. Instead of the kind dorm manager, this was the restaurant owner who refused to give a discount no matter how hard up a student was.
“Ah.”
And Kamijou noticed something off about the scene around him.
But this was not about the girls in red Santa outfits who barely seemed special anymore now that they stood in front of every single store, from the convenience stores and bakeries selling cakes to the karaoke boxes and even the conveyer belt sushi restaurants(!?).
“Touma?”
“Ahhh!? Wait, tell me it isn’t so!”
The ramen shop tucked below the elevated railway was gone.
It had not been good enough to make it into the magazines or onto the gourmet sites. When asked if the ramen was made with chicken or seafood, that awful place had answered “I dunno. Some kinda chemicals?” right in front of the customers. But they had sold a serving of ramen the size of a rice bowl, making it even smaller than the usual small size. That had been an irresistible temptation for Kamijou and the others who had wanted some restaurant ramen on the way home from school before having to think about what to do about dinner. And yet…and yet….
This was strange.
It made no sense. It would not have felt so bad if something equally unique had taken its place, but it was nothing but another fad donut shop with no history or personality at all! It would probably be forgotten the day after Christmas and gone by the New Year!! Kamijou Touma was hanging his head and trembling at this point. I don’t want my lucky color. Wh-where are you!? Where are you, old ramen chef!?
He could not fit in.
It just wasn’t possible for him. It was becoming clear that all allies of Christmas were his enemy. He was starting to think he never should have taken a step outside of the metal afro of a bird’s nest he had created by gathering up wire hangers. This winter would be a harsh one. It pained him that he had ever decided to head out on December 24.
He had come to a depressed stop, so perhaps he could not be blamed for not paying attention to his surroundings.
A girl suddenly bumped into him from the side in the area for pedestrians to wait for the crosswalk light.
“Kyah!?”
“Oh, sorr-”
He apologized on reflex but stopped himself. Yes, he had not been paying attention, but he had not moved a step (because he was rendered motionless below the frigid sky by the shock of losing that ramen shop), so it had clearly been the girl who bumped into him. Also, he felt a sticky sensation on the chest containing his heavy heart. He looked down to see a small paper plate stuck there like a cream pie from a comedy skit. It was one of those gooey things made of cream and honey – one of those blasphemous and indescribable cosmic horror donuts that were more about getting a photo than eating them!
“Oh.”
At times, the misfortune could pile on so thick his heart could not take it anymore.
Too many sad things had happened today.
While stained with some stranger’s lucky color, unlucky Kamijou Touma finally snapped.
“Hold it right there, little lady! I’ll have you know this fine article of clothing is made of simple polyester so it can keep the rain out and be washed in a normal washing machine! Have you ever shopped at the year-end sale at Uniclo!? I think not! How do you expect to pay for this luxurious 1980-yen finery!?”
While bragging about his cheap clothing for some reason or another, the sparking firework sticking into the donut caught his jacket on fire. This was his divine punishment for reflexively snapping back at the girl instead of checking on the extent of the damage. He frantically stripped off the jacket and began flapping it around to put out the fire.
And it turned out the trembling girl was one he had seen just yesterday.
It was Misaka Mikoto.
“I thought I detected the stench of death in my Christmas! What are you doing here, Misaka!?”
She was not listening.
She wordlessly dove toward Kamijou Touma’s jacketless chest and clung to his shirt with her small hands.
His mind went blank and the white nun next to him was caught completely off guard.
Then a storm arrived.
“Find the runaway!!”
“Don’t rely on security cameras and robots! She has Level 5 electricity powers!!”
“She is definitely around here somewhere. I can follow the trail left by Onee-sama. Hweh heh heh. Because I can detect the faint scent left behind by her hair!!”
A crowd of people marched by with tremendous speed. What in the world was that? It was a mixture of students and teachers, but since when had Tokiwadai Middle School been an angry mob???
What were Academy City’s security robots doing if they were ignoring that army of monsters?
Or had those drum-shaped devices already been installed with special rules that made them go easy on cute girls?
Kamijou Touma had been flapping his removed jacket around to put out the fire and Misaka Mikoto had moved past the jacket, so it was spread out like a matador’s cape and hid the small girl’s silhouette from the mob’s view.
“Misaka-san.”
“Yes?”
“Explain this.”
That might seem like a reasonable demand, but he meant it a little differently. He was not asking her to explain it to him. No, he jerked his chin over toward the person next to him while Mikoto continued holding onto him.
“Explain this to Index!! And fast because she’s already started growling!! I really, really don’t want to spend my Christmas Eve in the hospital with toothmarks on my skull!!”
It was too late.
Her jaws were latched onto his head, yet it was his knees that gave out.
