Yuuya already had his next steps mapped out: he would wait for Kiyama Harumi to unleash the AIM Burst, secure its Angel Core, break her out after Judgment and Anti-Skill apprehended her, and then hand over the First Sample to cure her beloved students, the Child Errors.
He felt a mild twinge of guilt for using her situation to his advantage, but Kiyama was one of the few genuinely noble educators in this dark city—a woman willing to declare war on the entirety of Academy City for the sake of her students. In a city rotten to the core, Kiyama-sensei was an irreproachable teacher.
"Yuuya, you promised to buy me crepes, right?" Index asked, her sparkling green eyes fixed on the open-air crepe stand ahead, a tiny droplet of drool escaping the corner of her mouth. "Although I don't particularly crave sweets right now, since it was a formal promise, I will generously allow you to fulfill it! It's my way of showing you respect!"
She seemed to have completely forgotten her anger over him flirting with Himegami Aisa just ten minutes prior.
"Well, I know you're starving, Index, but my cash is practically running on empty," Yuuya said, pulling out a flat wallet with a dry chuckle. "I need to drop by a bank or pawn shop to convert some gold ingots from my inventory into paper bills. Could you hold out just a little longer?"
Feeding Index was an expensive affair. Despite its absurd technological advancements, Academy City still stubbornly relied on physical paper bills and coins rather than digital currency—a practice Yuuya internally gave a massive thumbs down.
"But Yuuya, that's not what you promised earlier!" Index pouted, her cheeks swelling indignantly.
"Alright, alright. This is my last 1,000-yen bill," Yuuya sighed, holding up the crisp paper note. "You decide what we do with it."
"Can we get a crepe with extra strawberries?" Index asked softly, giving him her best puppy-dog eyes.
"It might be a few yen short for the extra toppings... but before we order, can I ask you a serious question, Index?" Yuuya asked, his tone dropping slightly.
"What question?" Index looked at him with innocent, wide eyes.
"Do you ever get jealous of all the girls surrounding me?" Yuuya asked quietly. Although he was generally carefree, he wasn't completely blind to the fact that having so many heroines converging around him could eventually spark an explosive situation.
"Jealous...?" Index's cheeks flushed a bright crimson. She puffed out her cheeks before a mischievous grin broke across her face. "Yuuya, why are you suddenly asking me something like that? Were you actually worried that I was upset earlier? I didn't expect you to care so much about a girl's feelings! I thought you were just a typical teenager going through puberty who only thinks about getting close to girls!"
Yuuya was speechlessly exasperated. "So in your eyes, I'm just a puberty-driven idiot? I guess I shouldn't have bothered asking."
"Well, it's mostly because the authority of your right hand carries a passive attraction effect," Index explained, her expression turning surprisingly serene as she smiled. "Even if Yuuya doesn't actively pursue it, girls will naturally be drawn into your orbit. But fortunately, Yuuya's core personality matches the weight of that authority. Otherwise, that attraction would bring nothing but disaster and tragedy to both you and the girls involved."
"Look at you, sounding like a genuine Saint for once, Index," Yuuya teased lightly, matching her relaxed tone. "I almost forgot you weren't just a bottomless stomach in a nun's habit. I've been constantly worried you'd gain weight at this rate."
"I am not just a foodie!" Index snapped indignantly, her eyebrows furrowing into an angry knot. "I can help you with so many things! I have 103,000 forbidden grimoires stored in my head—I can easily back you up when you fight real Magicians!"
"Hey, weren't you just teasing me a second ago? I was just teasing you back," Yuuya chuckled, waving his hand dismissively.
Seeing his nonchalant, playful smirk, Index completely lost her temper. She lunged forward with her mouth wide open. "Yuuya, you're teasing me again! Waaaaah!"
CHOMP!
"Go ahead and bite," Yuuya laughed, entirely unbothered. "It doesn't hurt anyway."
Meanwhile, after receiving crucial clues from Yuuya regarding the Level Upper, Shirai Kuroko and Uiharu Kazari rushed to the Central Neurological Hospital to analyze the forensic data.
"I never imagined the Level Upper was actually an artificially manipulated brainwave file," Kuroko exclaimed, staring in disbelief at the brainwave readouts on the monitor. "This is incredible... How can an audio track altering brainwaves artificially boost an Esper's calculation capacity?"
"And the fact that so many users are collapsing into comas matches Saten-san's theory perfectly," Uiharu added grimly. "Someone is intentionally using the student body as unwitting test subjects for a massive, dangerous experiment."
"The cause of the comas is a forced, systemic brainwave synchronization," a female researcher in a white coat explained, adjusting her glasses. "The users' brains are being forced to operate in lockstep with a central, dominant brainwave signature. The continuous processing load places an immense burden on the central nervous system, eventually overloading their brains and causing them to collapse."
"So if we locate the primary source of this master brainwave, we'll find the mastermind behind the entire incident?!" Uiharu asked urgently.
"In theory, yes," the researcher replied. "You're Judgment officers, right? You should be able to cross-reference the master brainwave signature with the city's central Data Bank to find a matching profile."
"Thank you so much for your help!" Kuroko said gratefully. Grabbing Uiharu's arm, she vanished from the room via spatial movement.
At the 177th Branch of Judgment, Uiharu threw herself in front of her terminal, her fingers flying across the mechanical keyboard in a blur. Suddenly, her eyes widened as a revelation struck her.
"I've got it! I know how an audio file can boost Esper powers!" Uiharu shouted. "It isn't directly upgrading their personal abilities—it's multiplying their raw calculation capacity!"
"What do you mean, Uiharu?" Kuroko asked, leaning over her shoulder.
"If we treat brainwaves like network signals and human brains like individual computers... what happens when thousands of human brains are linked together through a single, synchronized audio network?!" Uiharu explained excitedly.
Kuroko's eyes widened in realization. "A massively parallel processing array... an artificial supercomputer!"
"Exactly! By networking ten thousand Espers together, the system grants every individual user access to vast parallel processing power, artificially inflating their calculation tier! The dominant brainwave signature controlling this network has to belong to the mastermind!" Uiharu declared.
Ping!
Uiharu's fingers executed the final search query against the Data Bank. The monitor flashed red before pulling up a high-level profile.
A photo of a tired woman appeared on screen—disheveled hair, dark circles beneath her eyes, and a perpetually gloomy expression.
"Kiyama Harumi..." Kuroko's eyes narrowed dangerously. "She really is a senior researcher."
"Uiharu, notify Anti-Skill immediately! We can't let her escape!"
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Give me powerstones.
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