uniform and got her phone back out. There was something she needed to ask Uiharu. “Yes, that’s right. Could you be a dear and tell me where that utter piece of trash could have gone?”
2
After cleaning the bloodstains in the bathroom and dealing with her torn clothing, Shirai teleported again and exited onto the road behind the girls’ dormitory.
It was 8:30 PM .
Privately, she was a little surprised it hadn’t even been two hours since going shopping with Mikoto.
At this hour, the transportation facilities of Academy City would be mostly shut down for the night. The bus and train operation schedules were all aligned with the end of the school day, one reason being to prevent kids from being out late. The only things on the roads would be the cars of faculty and university students, taxis, and other trucks for business purposes.
It seemed that the traffic had already cleared up.
Of course, there were very few wheeled vehicles in Academy City to begin with, so it made everything look smooth.
Shirai took a breath of air. Its smell and taste had already changed to that of the nighttime.
“Umm, I have some useful news, Shirai.” Her cell phone was saying something. “It doesn’t seem like Awaki Musujime is able to move her own body continuously like you do. There was a note about that in the data banks. Do you remember how I told you her abilities went crazy during a curriculum she took two years ago?”
“Yes, what about it?”
“After that, she frequently made use of the school counselors. I wonder if it could have traumatized her somehow. She hasn’t gotten good results in experiments to make her own body move, and apparently she has a history of pushing herself so hard that her health breaks down. Like every time she moves her body, she has to summon all her courage to do it. Which means…”
“…That if she kept trying to warp herself, she’d get mentally exhausted in no time flat, is that it?” Shirai bit her lip a little. “I suppose I didn’t see Musujime teleport her own body during that battle. If she could do that in the first place, it would have been faster for her to steal the luggage herself and run away than it would be to call in outside agents. We can move at high speeds, ignoring walls and roads—we don’t need to limit ourselves to traditional means of pursuit.”
Even Shirai’s own abilities largely varied based on her mental state on a given day. Maybe Musujime’s strength would plummet, too, if she dug up the girl’s trauma during combat.
Still, though.
Is that why such a powerful esper is still stuck down here with me in terms of Level?
With that bitter idea in mind, Shirai began to teleport. Every time she advanced eighty meters and set foot on the ground again, she’d immediately determine her next destination and warp there.
In honesty, her body was such a mess that she could barely walk. At times like these, the ability to freely move continuously at a high speed seemed quite reliable.
“In Musujime’s case, she may be able to move things from far away, which I can’t—but on the other hand, the calculations are that much more demanding. I can only move things I’m touching, but that means I don’t have to calculate the coordinates of its original location.”
“Yes…I suppose so. —You can…shrink the calculations…that way. Anyway—as for the predicted routes…Musujime could utilize without…using Move Point…”
Shirai paid close attention to the voice coming out of the phone, which was stuttering because of the side effects of teleportation, but before Uiharu had the time to finish, Shirai was given the proper directions by something else.
Boom!!
A thunder-like noise reverberated from somewhere far away.
Kuroko Shirai looked up at the night sky. “Could that have been…?”
Academy City’s transportation facilities, store hours, and the like were all essentially made to match school hours. Lights faded quickly as the sun set, so
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