Toaru Majutsu no Index:Item Prologue
This is the story of a summer from over a year ago.
In other words, it is a retro, modern, high-tech, and smart incident from the past.
It is the crime-soaked story of how the dark side team named Item gained its fourth member.
Prologue: Feminine, Dangerous, Bright[edit]
The wall was thick.
It was supposed to be composite armor created from an alternating sandwich of polycarbonate and aramid fiber.
That meant it was far stronger than a bank vault.
But it was burned through in an instant.
A light blew away the unofficial research facility’s exterior wall along with the security guards who had noticed something was wrong.
A few people easily entered the secret area through the 2m hole that was still glowing red.
Then three beams flashed out in an almost offhand way.
That was all it took to blast through the labyrinthine research facility’s walls, trigger explosions, and tear the place to pieces. The security that should have activated in an emergency – not just the thick barricades, but the sprinklers and the alarm as well – had their wiring severed and failed to function.
After five seconds of this, everyone still alive had to have noticed something.
These blasts were not at all offhand. The beams of light were accurately melting and sealing every last exit, trapping the scattering researchers and security guards in their own personal jail.
Some girls walked through it all as casually as if this were the hallway at school.
The curvy girl in a summery sleeveless cardigan and a yoked skirt was Mugino Shizuri.
The girl with shoulder-length black hair in a pink track jacket and shorts was Takitsubo Rikou.
“Damn, I really need to stop eating so much bread. My legs are bloated.”
“Mugino, your problem is that you don’t exercise, not what you eat.”
It was a hot night, but the air conditioning must have been a little too cold because expressionless Takitsubo rubbed her bare thighs together as she replied.
“Hey, I’m out in front killing most of them myself.”
“You can kill anyone instantly with your power, so I don’t think that counts as exercise.”
Mugino Shizuri gently massaged her stocking-covered thigh with a hand.
Even during their carefree conversation, beams were flashing out from Mugino’s other palm. She vaporized an entire group of security guards who were unable to escape with the reinforced emergency exit door blocked.
Something landed at her feet.
It was a human arm still clutching a grenade.
“Mugino.”
“I see it.”
But not even that suicide blast could scratch Mugino Shizuri. Another beam blew it away. An explosion’s destruction was caused by the pressure created by accelerated heat and gas, so it was harmless if you had enough destructive power to repel the blast before it reached you.
She was one of only seven Level 5s within the 2.3 million population of Academy City.
Her power was known as Meltdowner.
It was a high-speed particle-wave cannon that could tear through any matter by ignoring quantum theory and forcibly firing electrons without transforming them into particles or a wave first. Ordinary explosives had been around for over a millennium, so the technological level was just too different. It was similar to how a group armed with chains and metal bats wouldn’t stand a chance against a brutally destructive giant robot.
Thick needles that looked more like spikes, electrodes, bottles of smelly chemicals, dentist chairs with sturdy restraint straps, and other grotesque items that seemed more like torture equipment than experimental tools were hit by even more destruction and scattered through the air in tiny pieces.
“Mugino, Mugino.”
Short, fluffy-haired Frenda Seivelun pulled a handmade explosive from below her short skirt and approached with an innocent smile. She was in full puppy mode.
She wore a thin poncho over a sailor-style short-sleeved white dress with black knee socks on her legs and a beret on her blonde head.
“In the end, we have to dispose of all the paper documents and computer equipment, right?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“What about the people?”
“Dispose of them.”
That was their job.
There were two types of explosions here. The Level 5 Meltdowner beams were a lot more noticeable, but pay careful attention and you would notice handmade explosives being tossed here and there as well. Although anyone stupid enough to take the time to get a good look at the grenades and rockets would soon be splattered up to the ceiling as blood and gore.
A rhythmic roar came from overhead.
“Up above,” said Takitsubo Rikou, standing straight and staring blankly.
“A helicopter, huh?”
Mugino Shizuri snorted and aimed her palm straight up. One beam was all it took to blast through to the roof and eliminate the heliport and the would-be escapees (probably whoever was in charge here).
But that wasn’t what the track suit girl had meant.
“Up above.”
“Yikes, that orange stuff is dripping down!!”
If Mugino hadn’t quickly hopped aside, the glowing goop created from heating the building materials to several thousand degrees Celsius would have landed right on her head. Being too strong could be a problem as well. This Level 5 wasn’t working with a team because she wasn’t powerful enough on her own.
Short Frenda stared at Takitsubo’s pink track suit.
“This is a big job, right? Takitsubo, you should buy something a little more seasonal once we get our pay. Y’know, like a sheer summer dress or a yukata that keeps falling off in places. Ooh, I know! In the end, aren’t China dresses summery?”
“I like this track suit best.”
“Wrong answer! Once we’ve been paid, you’re gonna be my dress-up doll!!”
“Um.”
When it came to combat, the pink track jacket and shorts girl always stayed a step behind.
She didn’t fight herself. She provided targeting assistance by detecting presences behind cover or walls. If she didn’t detect people’s lines of movement, the guns’ lines of fire, and even the dangerous pipes or high-voltage wires running through walls and ceilings, Mugino was liable to overdo things and self-destruct. They had to be extra careful in labs and industrial complexes.
The track suit girl shook a small container resembling a case of mechanical pencil lead.
“I do have some Body Crystal if we need it.”
“The espers aren’t the main target here, so don’t bother. It looks like we’re hunting down adults today,” casually replied Mugino, sending a scorching beam to the left and right to blow away the upper half of two security guards who were protecting an important-looking researcher. The wounds were instantly carbonized over, so there wasn’t even any gushing blood.
“Eek, eek!!”
The important researcher with a doctorate in some field of science (his primary subject of study was unethical human experimentation on children) fell on his rear, held out his hands, and shook his head. Over and over.
“W-wait. I won’t resist! I surr- I surrender!! You can do whatever you want to this place!!”
“Huh?”
Mugino Shizuri grunted in confusion.
The tilt of her head suggested she was truly baffled.
“Y-y-y-you’re a high-Level esper. Which means you’re a child – an unaffiliated hero. Ha ha. Let me guess, you’re here because you don’t like the dark side’s inhumane research or because you feel sorry for our child subjects. I’ll stop. I’ll never do this again. A-and if you’re this upset about the waste of life here, then you won’t want to kill defenseless people even if we are what you would call villains, right!? Heh hee, heh hee hee hee!!”
“Oh, that old argument.”
Something sizzled.
It was the sound of Meltdowner scorching the air and blowing away another security guard when he tried to escape. It didn’t matter to Mugino that he had dropped his weapon and had his back turned.
The researcher was at a loss for words and Mugino slowly crouched in front of him and leaned toward him.
“Hmm.” She tilted her head. “Hate to break it to you, but that wasn’t what we were hired to do.”
“Hired?”
“One of those heroes you mentioned is about to show up here, so we’re supposed to incinerate any problematic evidence before it can come to light.”
“…!? ~ ~ ~!!”
“And that evidence includes the information contained in people’s brains.”
Another sizzling sound.
Beyond her outstretched hand, the researcher’s entire head was missing.
The corpse didn’t even fall backwards.
“Sorry. A shitty villain like you might’ve had a chance to turn over a new leaf if I could erase specific memories like that psychological Level 5, but this is how I carry out jobs.”
The apology was only a word. There was no hint of guilt in her voice or on her face.
“Mugino,” said the pink track jacket and shorts girl, pointing further inside. “There’s something there. It doesn’t seem like an immediate threat, though.”
“Is it them?”
“Probably. The researchers went to the trouble of hiding both the room and its entrance.”
Mugino and Frenda exchanged a glance. Mugino and the others had been sent here because someone had detected signs of trouble at this research facility. The nature of the job meant they couldn’t keep relevant material on them, but they had memorized all the important people and things.
Mugino brushed the hair off her shoulder.
“Then give us 5 minutes to kill them all.”
They kept to the proposed schedule. Since no walls functioned as cover with Mugino, the security guards and researchers’ fates were sealed. After blowing up or vaporizing everything in the facility that moved, Mugino Shizuri and Frenda Seivelun walked through a space of death that smelled more scorched than bloody. They made their way back to the small room the track suit girl had informed them of.
“In the end, the latest game consoles are great! You can do fitness and health management on them.”
“Eh? Wouldn’t a contract with a 5-star gym be better? Then you can do Pilates and hot yoga.”
“Tsk, tsk, tsk. Muuugiiinooo, if you’re trying to go on a diet-”
“…”
“Ahem, if you want to stay in shape like the beautiful person you already are!! Then you can’t just set aside some time each day dedicated to it. If it isn’t incorporated into a stress-free activity with visible results, you won’t keep at it for long, will you? So in the end, what you need is a well-made exercise game contained on a single small game console!!”
This had originally been a secret area not found on any of the building diagrams, but their rampage through the facility had left the hidden door bent and lifted up from the wall. Takitsubo was faithfully waiting in front of the banged-up door, so Mugino had her stand back while she kicked the door down with bottom of her foot.
“Oh?”
Sealed pods of tempered glass were lined up along both walls. They were used for cold sleep
Each pod was about the size of a phonebooth.
“In the end, we couldn’t detect any heartbeats or breathing because they were kept in cold sleep.”
Frenda twirled a mobile device in her hand. Modern camera lenses provided a variety of functions, which was convenient for people who were up to no good. As long as they made sure to switch off the automatic transmission of location and other data the phone companies used to sell off your privacy, piece by piece.
Mugino wiped the white frost from the exterior of one pod to look inside.
It contained a naked girl.
She had a brown bob cut, pale skin, and only modest curves. Even with a generous estimate of her age, she had at most just entered middle school. Even her hair was frozen solid. She was like a fruit gelatin with all the gaps filled in with clear resin.
Mugino took another look around the room and estimated the total number of pods at more than 40.
“Just like the data we were given. They’re all human lockers.”
“Which makes them the last thing to deal with to safely erase the project. Kind of depressing when they’re all so defenseless, but what do you say? In the end, should we count them and make sure they’re all here before we blow them up?”
“No, let’s take some as a souvenir. Actually, one should be enough.”
Mugino’s irresponsible mood made it sound like she was impulse buying at a pet shop.
Frenda looked confused.
“What? I thought our job was to eliminate everyone and everything here.”
“Why should we do exactly what we’re told?”
“Fine, but I know better than to think you’re doing this out of the goodness of your heart. In the end, what’s your angle here?”
“First of all, our job is to erase some data the higher ups don’t want getting out. It was never spelled out in the job description, but they don’t want any concrete data that points to what they were doing here. They shouldn’t care about one of the kids who couldn’t explain what was done to them here. Think back to the job description. It specified killing the researchers and the security team, but it never mentioned the subjects. So we’re not actually required to kill them.”
“Makes sense,” said Frenda.
Neither of them was discussing this with the gravity of a life-or-death situation.
The decision to let these people live or die was entirely up to their whims.
“Takitsubo plays a valuable targeting role, but she can’t fight. My Meltdowner is too deadly to use in defense. I brought you in to fill that gap because I’d heard you were pretty good for a Level 0, but your specialty is bombs, not martial arts. You’re not exactly a defense specialist. And now we have the perfect candidates right here☆”
“Mugino, are you saying you want a defense-oriented esper?” asked Takitsubo.
“The Dark May Project artificially created high-Level espers by transplanting the #1’s thought patterns into their minds. Don’t you think something that unusual would make a good shield for you?”
Mugino made it sound like a question or suggestion, but Frenda and Takitsubo only shrugged. When Mugino decided to do something, there was no talking her out of it.
Frenda moved to the computer in a corner of the room.
“Let’s see, the project’s biggest successes were a pair of Level 4s. This says they’re called Offense Armor Kinuhata Saiai and Bomber Lance Kuroyoru Umidori. In the end, which one should we wake up?”
“The armor one.”
That was all it took for their paths to part.
One girl’s path would lead her to join those three while the other’s would lead her down a long, long journey that began here.
A deep mechanical thunk came from the thick protective glass. A change came over the clear solid within, which seemed like time and space solidified. It became a thick liquid. It was closer to being a gel than water. But it was soon sucked away by the many drains inside. Finally, the protective glass opened upwards.
“Hello, your name is Kinuhata Saiai, right? Do you understand the situation here?”
“…?”
The girl sat on the floor and stared blankly up at them.
Her brown bob cut was wet and flattened. The sticky gel dripped down from the undeveloped lines of her collarbones to her flat chest and down past her navel, but she didn’t seem to mind.
Takitsubo expressionlessly tilted her head.
“She isn’t screaming?”
“She probably isn’t even aware she’s naked. She was only just unfrozen, so the blood hasn’t gotten to her head yet.”
The way she looked up at them seemed more like a reflexive reaction to external stimuli than a willful action. Like the slow movements of a touch-me-not.
Takitsubo Rikou placed a brand-new towel over the naked girl’s head. It was likely an amenity kept on hand for situations like this.
“Mugino.”
The pink track jacket and shorts girl was looking elsewhere. She was clearly focused on something beyond the wall. Mugino Shizuri was a self-admitted battle freak, but at times like this, she prioritized Takitsubo’s vague “premonitions” or “bad feelings” above all else. The dark side girls knew from experience that they would regret it if they didn’t.
“I sense a disturbance to the south-southwest. I don’t think we can stay much longer.”
“Oh, the ordinary Anti-Skill got to work faster than expected. Then let’s make sure we’re gone in 180 seconds.”
“Eh? Wait! What about the rest of the subjects in cold sleep? In the end, there’s still a bunch of them!!”
Frenda panicked and Mugino had a simple answer.
“My second reason for keeping them alive is they make the perfect fall guys. Frenda, the process runs automatically once you input the command, right? Set the thawing process to run at low speed. Right after they wake up in 180 seconds, Academy City’s defenders of peace will arrive. And then…”
Mugino stopped talking and looked to the side.
The naked girl named Kinuhata Saiai still had that blank look in her eyes, so Takitsubo was assisting her. Her circulation still hadn’t fully recovered. She showed no embarrassment or resistance while Takitsubo toweled the bio electrolyte gel from her hair and body. She was even nakedly raising her arms to assist.
Mugino Shizuri pointed at a different pod.
“Anti-Skill will conclude this Kuroyoru Umidori girl snapped and destroyed the lab while still dazed from the thawing process. With everything they’ve done to her, she’s bound to have a reason to want to. So we let this avenger have this high score and we get off scot-free.”
Takitsubo was a good girl (by this group’s standards), so her face clouded over some and Frenda noticed.
“But will that really work? In the end, destruction caused by your Meltdowner won’t look anything like destruction by her nitrogen lances. No one who knows what to look for will be fooled.”
“That’s the entire point.”
There was a sizzling sound as something solid was fully evaporated. They were about to escape, but Mugino needlessly fired an ultra-hot Meltdowner beam at a random spot on the floor.
“If we perfectly covered up our involvement, we couldn’t prove we completed our job. So we leave a sign that the dark side will understand but ordinary people won’t. Otherwise, our client might refuse to pay us or some other dark side operative might take credit and steal it from us. And going on an enraged rampage to get our money back just sounds like a pain to me.”
Frenda’s shoulders slumped at that.
They were on completely different levels when it came to being criminals.
Mugino gave two satisfied nods as the machinery began to operate and made her way to the small room’s exit. She made sure to fire a second and third Meltdowner beam at a random part of the wall and ceiling as she did so.
“C’mon, get on your feet and escape. And make sure Anti-Skill doesn’t see you. If they do, we’ll have to slaughter them too, so be careful.”
“You do know most criminals want to avoid Anti-Skill for the opposite reason, don’t you?”
Yomikawa Aiho of Anti-Skill broke through the unofficial research facility’s front gate with a large team.
This happened only 90 seconds after a shadowy group of girls slipped out through a large hole in the wall.
It was a sultry night.
Academy City was located in western Tokyo, so it was enveloped in an inland heat even at night. And this was an ecological city that primarily used wind power, so the heat island effect was impressive.
District 17 was an unmanned factory district and its uniquely gorgeous nightscape had gained some minor attention on factory tour sites and such. Currently, a 12-person microbus with all its rear windows tinted was driving through that district. Maybe it was simpler to call it a TV studio bus.
But open the rear door and you would find fluffy carpet, a real leather sofa arranged in three sides of a square, a glass table, a vacuum tube analog audio system, a minifridge, and more.
From the outside, it was a rundown old bus that couldn’t be worth more than 300 thousand yen, but on the inside, it was a luxury limousine worth more than 50 million yen. The sofa and carpet were of the finest quality and the Chanel wastebasket in the corner was worth as much as a gigantic gaming PC. This was what the dark side girls used for transportation.
“Go,” briefly whispered Mugino.
“You got it.”
The driver’s hair was dyed bright, he wore a thick gold necklace, and he was chewing gum. Many types of people wound up on the dark side, but if you wanted a driver, the back-alley delinquents were your best bet. They had the skills, but they weren’t marked. And more importantly, they were easily replaced if they were lost during a job.
They were fleeing the scene, but the driver obeyed the speed limit as they drove through that factory district full of triple-blade wind turbines. They even passed right by the Anti-Skill vehicles flashing their lights at the front gate. The filthy studio bus slowly but surely left the scene.
Villains tended to feel a rush of endorphins as soon as they had crossed the district border and left the danger zone. At this point, there was no tracking them with only the standard drum-style security robots patrols.
“Yay!! That went perfect!! In the end, it went off without a hitch!!”
“Yay.”
Frenda and Takitsubo celebrated while getting to work on a small bottle of cider taken from the minifridge. The 5-star blue cheese and ham they snacked on was weeping at the drink pairing. And for some reason, there was a can of cheap mackerel mixed into the lineup.
A thick cloth audibly rustled. That was a towel. Kinuhata Saiai had finally recovered from her cold sleep and her ordinary embarrassment and confusion were kicking in.
Bagworm Girl Kinuhata Saiai was curled up in a corner and gave the other girls an inquisitive look.
“Super who are you people?”
“We’re not heroes, I can tell you that.”
That was all Mugino Shizuri opted to say while chuckling.
But it was enough for Kinuhata to understand she had not yet escaped the dark side. She had been raised as a lab animal in the depths of a research facility, so she had no legal identity, address, or student ID. If she was dumped out of this bus, she would only find an endless life of poverty and homelessness. And without any clothes at that.
No matter how unfair it seemed, her only way to avoid that was to rely on these dark side girls.
She had to be all too aware that she was about to be presented with a flood of information and definite death awaited her if she missed a single piece of it.
But despite the situation, Mugino Shizuri casually spread her arms and asked a question.
“So how do you like your first taste of freedom?”
The clock in the bus had just reached midnight of July 1.
Kinuhata Saiai smiled a little.
For some reason, that question seemed to change the unseen rules.
These people weren’t good or righteous, but she now knew she had found herself in a situation she couldn’t have hoped for even after a hundred years of being given nothing but air, food, electricity, and drugs in a sterile room.
The small girl slowly narrowed her eyes.
“It’s super not bad at all.”
These girls were Item – the strongest elite four-person team found in the very depths of Academy City’s darkness.
Between the Lines 1[edit]
(Note: The following is only saved in and managed by this undisclosed independent archive kept separate from the Bank. For many criminals, their information is disclosed here to admit to their secret links with the city’s leaders and to provide a sign of their trust. Generally speaking, the dark side dislikes being told what to do, but they are aware of the many hidden attempts to take control of the city’s darkness and are willing to perform the daily work to preserve the darkness.
This data will be kept secret even if it means taking a life. In other words, handle it with care. It does not matter if you are directly responsible or not. It could be a simple error or a cyber-attack by someone else. If the information leaks out, know that you have killed whoever illegitimately accessed it.)
Mugino Shizuri.
Level 5 Meltdowner.
One of the seven current Level 5s. By firing electrons in a state that is neither a particle nor a wave, her power creates a strong resistance that applies massive heat and friction to the target and forcibly burns through it. As a weapon, this power is classified as a high-speed particle-wave cannon. By its nature, this power is expected to have a wide-variety of research applications, including new weapons development, proof of zero-dimensional matter, and non-laser nuclear fusion reactors. Her power has the highly unique property of manipulating the state of an electron no matter who is observing it, which could have applications in a new type of quantum computer, quantum cryptography, highly flexible AI development, and next-generation high-volume high-speed communications. (Note: Some results of this research have begun to be incorporated into the Aneri Project, among others. See separate entry for details.)
There is a risk of mutual interference with the Railgun, another electric Level 5. Be cognizant of this when designing their research facilities.
Takitsubo Rikou.
Level 4 AIM Stalker.
Her power accurately records and saves the AIM Diffusion Field weakly emitted subconsciously by an esper so she can track it. Once she has recorded it, there are no distance limitations on tracking it, so she can accurately track it even if they flee the solar system. However, this recording and searching of AIM Diffusion Fields requires the oral consumption of a special powder known as Body Crystal, which has high production costs and powerful side effects. (Note: Further details on Body Crystal cannot be viewed without an authorization key from 1 Board of Directors member.)
Even when not using Body Crystal, she makes comments which suggest she is receiving something (e.g., “I detect a signal from the south-southwest”), but what this means is entirely unknown. It isn’t known if this premonition or sixth sense comes from her power or if she is subconsciously detecting something based on her experience.
Also, there are still many unsolved mysteries regarding her AIM Stalker power. Data on it is protected unusually strictly for a Level 4 and there are signs that her Bank data is incomplete. This could be related to that project the entire Board of Directors is (Note: The rest of this entry cannot be viewed without an authorization key from 6 Board of Directors members.)
Frenda Seivelun.
Level 0.
She has no esper power, but she excels at using a variety of explosives (albeit without any licensing or authorization) and she knows how to fight hand-to-hand. But since her combat style appears unique, it is likely something she learned on-the-job in order to survive in the dark side as a Level 0.
Her knowledge of explosives, and of chemical synthesis as a whole, is on par with a university professor. The lack of obvious burns and scarring on her body suggests this knowledge was not obtained through self-taught trial-and-error, but it is unknown who taught her. She has too many friends and acquaintances to make a determination.
Because she has an unusually wide range of friends and wants for nothing in her life, it is unclear why she has chosen to place herself in the dark side. For a time, it was suspected she was an undercover agent for Judgment or an online news site who was given the necessary chemistry knowledge with a Testament, but that theory has since been disproven. Which leaves her as even more of an enigma. If the cumulative points against her ever exceed 10, form an investigation team to look into it.
(Note: New Record. File partially copied over from Dark May Project entry.)
Kinuhata Saiai.
Level 4 Offense Armor.
Her power controls the nitrogen in the air to surround her body with a layer of ultra-compressed gas as a solid defense or to artificially boost her strength. The defense in particular will automatically react even to surprise attacks from her blind spots. It is also sturdy enough to leave her entirely unscathed from a shotgun blast at point-blank range. She is a close-quarters specialist, but her specs are so high the outcome of the battle is mostly determined by whether or not she can limit the battle to close range.
She was also a subject of the Dark May Project, meaning a portion of #1 Accelerator’s thought patterns were transplanted into her mind. (Note: See separate entry for project details.) The way her Offense Armor automatically activates to protect her comes from the successful adoption of an inferior version of the reflection equations the #1 loves to use. Related to this, there are reports of her manner of speech changing when she is excited.
