The two second-year Tokiwadai seniors had successfully linked up, signaling the beginning of the end for this incident.
However, unlike their usual confrontational and incompatible dynamic, Shokuhou-senpai was unusually quiet after regaining consciousness.
She offered no resistance as a certain Railgun proceeded to maneuver her around, eventually hoisting the 50+ kilogram girl onto her back.
"Shokuhou Misaki... I'm sorry about this time. It was my fault you got dragged into this."
Misaka-senpai's expression was conflicted, as if she didn't want to show weakness in front of her rival.
But upon seeing the other girl's sorry state, she let out a soft sigh and spoke honestly, her face clouded with gloom.
Initially, she'd been convinced Shokuhou Misaki had ulterior motives, even despite her own kouhai Natsume's strenuous attempts to explain otherwise.
Yet, after experiencing the entire event, Misaka-senpai now understood that Shokuhou held no malice towards her—in fact, she'd become one of Kihara Gensei's targets precisely because of Misaka.
"Is that so? Well, since Misaka-san is apologizing so sincerely, I suppose I can grudgingly forgive you, if only for Natsume-san's sake."
"Though I must say, I never imagined Kihara Gensei would set his sights on me. That explains how my whereabouts were compromised."
Shokuhou Misaki blinked, an unusual glint in her starry eyes, her thoughts seeming to drift.
The moment the Exterior had been snatched by Kihara Gensei, she'd already pieced together many things.
Now, combined with what Misaka Mikoto had recounted of her own ordeal, numerous puzzles in her mind were solved.
The reason for that inexplicable ambush at the juvenile correctional facility became clear.
"Kihara Gensei obtained the login credentials for the Exterior from me. Right now, even I can't forcibly revoke his access. I can't even input the self-destruct code." Her voice was laced with frustration.
"After all, only one person can be logged into the Exterior at any time."
Weaving through the dense cluster of buildings, Misaka-senpai followed the directions from the plump girl on her back, heading towards a specific building in District 7 that housed the Exterior.
That building was originally one of the sites for the Child Error laboratory, used to cultivate tissue excised from Shokuhou Misaki's own cerebral cortex, hypertrophying it to create brainwashing weapons. In essence, it was a project to mass-produce Mental Out ability users.
This plan bore some resemblance to the Vector Control Computech Suit and the Sisters Project. The key difference was its maturity—it had already reached a developed stage, only to be hijacked by a certain Mental Out who struck first.
"So the Exterior is how Kihara Gensei can use Mental Out," Misaka-senpai murmured, nodding to herself, and unconsciously quickened her pace.
Even without fully understanding what the Exterior was, Misaka Mikoto could guess its function.
It was likely a deeply guarded secret of this blonde classmate, one she wouldn't have revealed so easily if Kihara Gensei hadn't backed her into a corner.
"However," Shokuhou continued, her voice weak, "if we can mimic Kihara Gensei's method and achieve brainwave synchronization with the Exterior, we could bypass the single-user limitation. We might still have time to input the self-destruct code."
After weighing the pros and cons, she had decided to destroy the Exterior.
With such a critical vulnerability exposed, keeping it active was more risk than reward. Shokuhou Misaki couldn't guarantee it wouldn't be seized again in a similar manner.
While neither of them knew how to achieve brainwave synchronization themselves, Kiyama Harumi still had backups of the Level Upper.
By compiling the Level Upper's audio file into brainwave data and inputting it into the Exterior, the plan became feasible.
Just then, Misaka-senpai's steps halted abruptly, a look of surprise and relief flashing across her face as information from Uiharu came through her earpiece.
"What is it?" Shokuhou asked, her head jostled by the sudden stop, a pressure building in her chest.
"Kihara Gensei... Sonoko took care of him," Misaka-senpai reported, letting out a sigh of relief, immediately crediting Natsume-san with the resolution.
--+--
District 7, Safe House Building.
This building, used for the temporary housing of the Sisters, wasn't far from the sites of the Level 6 Shift Project experiments.
Surprisingly, the structure remained largely intact, with only minor damage to parts of the walls from the peripheral effects of battles.
This was likely thanks to the deliberate protection efforts of a certain white-haired individual, who had safeguarded the building while protecting the Sisters.
However, the internal wiring had been destroyed, rendering all electrical appliances inoperable—an unavoidable casualty.
"Onee-sama! So many Onee-samas! Kuroko is in heaven!"
"To protect the future of all Onee-samas, please allow Kuroko to do even more!"
"No, Shirai-san, you're injured too! You need to rest properly!" Saten-san's exclamation seemed to be mixed in the background.
"Kuroko, behave yourself!" That was a certain Railgun's fierce warning, though she ultimately resisted the urge to unleash a 100,000-volt shock.
The empty building now held a buzz of activity.
The tea-colored twin-tailed Judgment officer was displaying unprecedented enthusiasm, diligently caring for the Sisters who were gradually waking from their comas.
Although Shirai-san had known about the existence of Misaka-senpai's clones before, the impact of seeing hundreds of Sisters seemed to have overexcited her, erasing any prior traces of melancholy.
Though, judging by some of her more questionable remarks, perhaps someone else should be doing this job.
Over ten minutes had passed since everyone had regrouped. The building's elevators were out of order, so everyone was gathered on the lower floors near the ground.
Shokuhou-senpai had also taken charge of Kihara Gensei, steadily extracting numerous memories from his brain.
Organizing the data on the memory viruses Kihara had implanted made it relatively easy to overwrite the corrupted sections within the Sisters' memories.
As new memories were uploaded and spread across the Misaka Network, Sisters all around the world gradually began to awaken.
"So we still need Shokuhou-senpai to negotiate with the Board of Directors to handle the... fallout from Kihara Gensei?"
Leaning idly against the windowsill, Natsume Sonoko showed little interest in the matters being discussed by the two seniors nearby, important as they were.
Shokuhou-senpai seemed to have some connection with a Board Member named Yakumi Hisako, and also mentioned Senpai Kumokawa Seria who also had direct channels of communication with the Board.
Given Kihara Gensei's sensitive status and the involvement of various agencies and Dark Side organizations this time, the amount of necessary post-incident handling was staggering.
Fortunately, Shokuhou-senpai, as the professional in such matters, could take charge.
Compared to Shokuhou-senpai, the other two Tokiwadai Level 5s seemed rather naive, offering little in the way of viable plans when it came to dealing with the authorities.
According to Shokuhou-senpai's earlier analysis, while they couldn't dictate Academy City's disposition of Kihara Gensei, as victims of this series of events, they at least shouldn't face reprimands from the Board.
We're the ones who suffered unjust treatment, and our minimum demand is simply to avoid punishment from the city's officials, with no guarantee of any compensation either.
This was part of the reason Natsume found the whole affair so uninteresting.
This awkward situation fundamentally highlighted the severe lack of voice and leverage the student body possessed.
"However, before we hand Kihara Gensei over to Academy City," Shokuhou-senpai's voice cut through her thoughts, suddenly sharp and carrying a hint of menace, "I'll be performing some... special adjustments to his brain. He'll never be able to concentrate on complex thought again."
Leaning against the windowsill near the two injured girls, she added coldly, "I'll also erase all data about us from his mind. To prevent that critical information from falling into the hands of certain parties within Academy City."
Unlike Natsume, Shokuhou Misaki was never one for mercy. She had her limits as an esper, but she understood the necessity of pragmatism all too well.
--+--
T/N: I have a Patreon! While it may seem empty as of now, webnovel will get 3 Chapters Every Day, and advanced chapters will be uploaded on Patreon.
It may not seem worth it now, but maybe in the future. Who knows!
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If you guys wanna check it out.