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- “What the hell?! W-wh-wh-what just happened!?”
- One of the guards, Shar Berylan, crouched down on the white snowy field as he yelled. In
- the -20 degrees Celsius environment, this would normally be considered suicidal.
- However, it was easy to imagine that if he lift his head up, he would die faster than freezing
- to death. His aim was to hide his body; thus, he couldn’t hide on the road that had melted
- the snow by thermal effect.
- “Didn’t they say that we can match the enemy in power if we use Academy City’s
- unmanned weapons!?”
- Even though he roared into the radio, he couldn’t get a response. He couldn’t get through
- with a cell phone either.
- Then, in front of him, a large block-shaped object dropped. It was the remains of the
- powered suits that used unmanned technology, the ones that had torn through the
- Russian tanks and armored vehicles in World War III.
- Yes, the remains.
- The sturdy complex armor looked like it was cheese eaten through by mice as tens of
- thousands of holes had pierced through it. It was unknown if the armor became like that
- because it had approached an anti-tank mine and triggered an explosion. There wasn’t
- even remains of just one. If Shar could have stood up and looked around, he would have
- found that even the blizzard couldn’t hide the large amount of the barricade-forming
- debris.
- “...This is completely preposterous.”
- Shar blankly muttered to himself.
- A large weapon with the silhouette resembling that of a mantis moved forward with broad
- steps. Its two front legs seemed to have Gatling guns, but the scale of destruction was
- obviously completely different. Was this scene of disaster caused by the firepower of a
- tank’s smoothbore gun firing thousands of cannon rounds every minute? To be honest,
- there was no obvious reason to bind a gun to a set cannon fire rate...unless it was out of
- bad taste.
- FIVE_Over.
- Modelcase_”RAILGUN”.
- Shar didn’t understand the meaning of the writing on the machine, but he could tell that
- it was a monster. This monster was spewing out a large amount of cannon shells. The
- monsters were either moving on the snowy plains or flying in the skies, and Shar could
- identify at least twenty of the machines.
- It was blatantly clear the gap in technological might.
- It was like using stealth bombers on cavalry.
- It was no longer a matter of mere supernatural powers. That was not the only weapon of
- Academy City. There were a lot of weird people gathered in the Natural Selector
- tournament, but it was impossible to imagine that they could defeat those large mantises
- barehanded.
- (We can’t win.)
- Shar’s immediate thought was that of hopelessness. The idea of trying to take the initiative
- was wrong. Defeat aside, he was even wondering if escape would be a form of victory. If
- he were to decide, it was just a matter of whether to resist until death, or not resist and
- die.
- Which path would be more painful?
- Which path would gain more honor?
- Which path would gain redemption?
- Shar felt that it was similar to security software. In a certain faraway country, with a single
- mouse click, a large number of unmanned weapons could begin to take action to clean up
- any antagonistic parties—or rather, eliminate them. During this process, the details of
- actions taken would have no bearing at all. Once it was shown that there were no enemies
- remaining, everyone would rejoice. It was that kind of war.
- They had made a mistake fighting this enemy.
- They had made a mistake in how they fought.
- If there was an enemy, there would be a massacre. It was that kind of war. Thus, there
- was no differentiation between Academy City and the Anti-Academy City forces. The
- moment the virus list in the security software updated, they lost all chance of being spared.
- Shar and the rest were just elevated to the level in the latest generation of the update
- where they were to be eliminated.
- They were then discovered.
- They were then attacked.
- They were then killed.
- “...”
- At that moment, Shar Berylan held his breath.
- All of the sounds vanished.
- He knew what this unnatural silence meant. His teeth were chattering, and he remained
- prone on the ground as he slowly lifted his head. As the degree of motion was too awkward,
- his head throbbed, but there was no time to be concerned with that.
- It flew.
- It stopped.
- The large machine resembling a mantis had flown like a bee or a dragonfly above Shar’s
- head. The sickle-shaped arm pointed the Gatling gun and aimed at Shar. He watched the
- cluster barrel spin rapidly, and realized something.
- (Ah, it’s not that the sound has vanished, but that there’s something wrong with my head.)
- However, the machine didn’t continue.
- The monster seemed likely to be linked with a mobile radar as it could even shoot down
- fighter planes and the air-to-surface missiles. Thus, even if he continued to roll a few times
- like those action movies, there wouldn’t be any change to the outcome.
- It was over.
- (Just like how viruses are killed, I’ll be cleaned off and represented with a kill counter of
- + 1.)
- However, right when Shar Berylan thought that, a strange change happened.
- The mantis’ behavior suddenly changed. It wasn’t just the one machine that was aiming
- at Shar from above, as he could see that the other 20+ machines’ guns were pointed at a
- certain location. It was clearly a precautionary move. The powered suits had clearly gone
- from eliminating the enemy to searching for the enemy.
- (What? What’s going on?)
- The sweat on Shar’s body was stuck. He continued to lie on the ground with his eyes being
- the only part of his body moving. Someone was on the edge of his vision. In this white hell,
- a silhouette was standing there.
- They wore a long coat.
- A helmet covered their face.
- They had an androgynous profile that made it hard to tell whether they were male or
- female. Shar didn’t know whether they would improve the situation, but he felt that it was
- strange for the surrounding mantises to focus on that person.
- “...”
- The person remained silent.
- They merely clenched their right hand tightly.
- -Shinyaku Toaru Majutsu no Index Volume 4 Sub.08
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