Chapter 250: Magic and Superpowers Cannot Coexist
Previously, Kazakiri Hyouka had always lived in a virtual world. She couldn't touch humans, nor could she speak with them. Like a wandering ghost, she drifted through Academy City, filled with fear and loneliness.
Until a few days ago, she accidentally made contact with Index. Because of Index's power, she transitioned from illusion into reality and experienced what it meant to have friends and to feel joy.
"Since I'm a monster, let this monster deal with you—another monster."
Activating the energy within her, Kazakiri Hyouka's shattered body instantly regenerated. Then, with a powerful lift of her arms, she actually blocked another attack from the stone giant.
However, she barely managed to stop one of its hands.
"Interesting. Things are getting more and more interesting."
George squinted his eyes slightly as he looked at the scene before him.
Kazakiri Hyouka was the collective embodiment of the AIM diffusion fields naturally emitted by 2.3 million esper students. He was certain this wasn't a coincidence—it must be another large-scale experiment by Academy City.
"It's over!"
The stone giant's left fist was blocked by Kazakiri Hyouka, and its right fist smashed fiercely toward Index.
At that moment, George finally appeared and took action.
"Railgun!"
He flicked a coin with his fingers. The Railgun fired, directly shattering the stone giant's right hand.
"Who's there? You again?! Don't think I'm really afraid of you!"
Sherry was shocked and turned to look at the suddenly appearing George, frowning once again.
Although he had changed into male clothing and was wearing a hat, she instantly recognized him as the Level 5 esper Misaka Mikoto—the same moves gave it away.
"It can even regenerate… Seems like it's not a one-time creation."
George noticed that the stone giant's severed right hand had returned to normal within seconds. He showed a trace of surprise.
He had thought Sherry's stone giant was the same as the one summoned by the apprentice magician Howard in the previous magician's world—something that would vanish once destroyed. But now it seemed there were some differences.
However, this only piqued his interest further.
"Even if you attack a hundred times or a thousand, you can't destroy my Alice."
Sherry waved her wax crayon, activating an amplification magic circle. The stone giant grew from five meters to eight, becoming even more powerful.
"Alice, kill them all!"
The stone giant roared, clapped its hands together, and slammed them toward George.
[Translator: sauron05]
George didn't meet the attack head-on. Instead, grabbing Kazakiri Hyouka in one hand and Index in the other, he jumped backward to evade.
"If attacking certain areas doesn't work, then let's try destroying everything."
He set the two girls down, clasped his hands together, then pulled them apart to form a particle cannon.
He poured all his electric power into the cannon and aimed it at the stone giant charging toward them.
"Plasma Railgun!"
A massive blast of plasma burst out, vaporizing the stone giant at the chest. Then, with a sweep of his hand, the plasma beam swept from head to toe, disintegrating the entire creature into the air.
This time, the stone giant did not regenerate.
"Seems like it needs to be completely destroyed in one go to be eliminated."
"This… this is the power of a Level 5 esper?"
Sherry stared as her stone giant was completely vaporized, her heart trembling.
"How can he be this strong?!"
She had known Level 5 espers were powerful, but not to the extent that they could one-shot her Alice.
"It won't be that easy. Let's see how many more times you can fire an attack like that."
After coming to her senses, she immediately began chanting and used her wax crayon to draw a magic circle on the ground. In less than a second, another stone giant rose from the earth.
However, before she could lift her head to command the stone giant, her pupils suddenly contracted.
Because she heard George's voice—right by her ear.
"So the key lies with you. Only by defeating you can I stop the stone giant from regenerating."
She rose to counter with an elbow strike but hit nothing but air. Before she could react again, her mind went blank, and she collapsed to the ground.
It turned out that when George saw her summoning another stone giant, he immediately used electricity to stimulate his body and moved at high speed to get behind her. Dodging her elbow strike, he knocked her out with a palm strike to her forehead.
"Looks like magicians in this world don't have strong physical bodies either. I wonder if she's just an exception."
In truth, this female magician wasn't weak. Her summoned stone giant had tremendous strength, high defense, and self-healing abilities. Even if it was destroyed in one strike, she could summon another.
Ordinary espers would have a hard time dealing with her. Even Misaka Mikoto would probably struggle without using her thunder giant.
But the key was that this magician needed to stay hidden while controlling her summons. Standing out in the open like that with poor close combat ability made her an easy target.
"Let me take a look at your memories."
This female magician wasn't weak—she probably had some standing in the magical world, and there was likely valuable information to be gleaned.
"Memory Extraction!"
Using the spell "Memory Extraction" combined with telepathy, George placed his hand on Sherry's forehead and began reading her memories.
How many memories does a person accumulate in over twenty years?
Definitely a lot. Even filtering out the unimportant ones, just viewing the key memories as if they were recordings would take months to go through.
But that's under normal circumstances.
Within the human brain, thoughts move at high speeds, the mind scans quickly, and the speed of memory reading is far beyond that of real-time playback.
It's like dreaming—feeling like a long time has passed in the dream, only to wake up and find that only moments had passed.
Especially during a quick nap on a desk.
So, in under a minute, George removed his hand from Sherry's forehead—his expression nothing short of astonished.
"Unbelievable. So that's how it is!"
The information George gained from reading Sherry's memory far exceeded his expectations, finally allowing him to understand this world.
Let's first talk about Sherry's background.
Sherry Cromwell—a magician belonging to the British Puritan special force "Necessarius."
She specialized in earth-attribute magic, particularly the manipulation of golems. She was also the British Puritan's code interpretation officer, an expert in decoding, constructing, and preserving hidden ciphers embedded in symbolic paintings and crests.
Twenty years ago, some magicians from British Puritanism and a number of scientists from Academy City shared a vision. They wanted to bring magic and science together.
They aimed to pool their respective technologies and knowledge in a single facility, attempting to combine superpowers and magic to create a new kind of practitioner.
A practitioner who could wield both superpowers and magic—such a being would be the ultimate existence.
But the result was clear: failure.
In this world, magic and superpowers cannot coexist. At best, one bleeds from every orifice and suffers grievous injuries. At worst, the body collapses and dies outright.
(End of Chapter)