World War 3. The conflict between science and magic had grown to that level. Multiple powers had manipulated events in secret to bring about war, but it was now a conflict which threatened everyone whether they belonged to magic, science, or neither.
A Level 0 had fled from Japan to Russia, the center of the intense conflict between the two opposing great forces known as the Roman Catholic Church and Academy City. It seemed insane, but this was the safest option for now. He knew nothing about the magic side nor the true cause of this war, yet he came to Russia for the sake of himself and the girl he wanted to save.
He had to flee his own home of Academy City to avoid death, but knew neither of them could survive unless they returned there someday.
But before that could happen, he had to deal with the most immediate threat.
The #4 of Academy City. He had to settle things with her once and for all.
Just how deep was this monster's obsession with him?
Why wouldn't she die?
Why had she come all the way to Russia from Japan on an Academy City bomber?
Why was settling an old grudge with a Level 0 like him that so important that she felt the need to increase her already overwhelming power with Body Crystal and utterly annihilate him?
The severity of Mugino Shizuri's actions didn't match the threat posed by her enemy. So why did she feel she had to go this far? The gap between their abilities was on the same scale as a tank crushing an ant or a speck of dust being swallowed up by the Sun. It was just unfair.
He was weary of it all. And he finally had a chance to end it.
The Level 5 lay on the ground as a pitiful shadow of her former self. She consumed too much of the same substance that had eaten away at Takitsubo Rikou's body. She gained a ridiculous amount of power for a brief time, but this was the end result.
This seemed like the most ironic punishment possible for all she had done. Destroyed by her own power and prideful nature.
Still nervously clutching the rifle in his hand, Hamazura slowly stepped forward and spoke to her.
"Mugino, if something like karma exists, this is definitely it," he said.
She didn't have the energy stand and face him, but Mugino slowly lifted her head and glared at her hated enemy.
Just what was the difference between them? Why couldn't she beat this Level 0? Why was she, the #4, in this situation after doing everything in her power to kill him?
"Fuck...you...Hamazura..."
She could only manage to weakly utter those words. Even now, her grudge was the source of her determination.
"Maybe I'm not right to judge you, Mugino. I don't know anything about the kind of life you lived before joining ITEM. I don't know what led you down this path and made you this way, but you've definitely taken it too far."
She was a person who easily turned her Level 5 power against her own friends and comrades because something made her angry. Just how broken and ugly did she have to be on the inside?
She was a monster. Whether she had been born that way, or whether the cruel environment of Academy City had sent her down that path, that could not be denied.
"Why."
Hamazura asked himself that simple question.
"Why did things have to get so fucked up? I just wanted to go back to the way things were. I never wanted anything to do with ITEM! I miss the days when I could just hang out with my dumb friends, get into trouble and have some fights, and laugh about it all at the end of the day. You espers have been responsible for everything that's gone wrong!" he yelled. It sounded like he was going back to his old self. Would he have been forced down this path of darkness if Accelerator had not killed Skill Out's leader?
"Why did this ridiculous shit have to happen to me? All that shit about defeating the #4, who gives a fuck about any of that? From the beginning, I've been terrified! Those adults in Academy City decided I had to die just because I didn't do things according to their plans? Why the hell do we have to keep fighting and risking our lives over such pointless things?"
He couldn't be like that other Level 0. He did not think he was courageous enough to get place himself in unreasonable danger situation if there were no benefit for himself and the people around him. And he wasn't such a good person that he could easily overlook the actions of someone who had threatened everything he cared for.
Although he had once come very close before someone had stopped him, he'd never crossed that final line and killed a human being. But did Mugino really fit into that category?
She was like something out of a horror movie. She was more similar to a act of nature or a disaster like a nuclear bomb.
But his enemy was now powerless. He could kill her and end this.
Would a person like her change if you gave them an entire lifetime? And even if she had succeeded in killing him, he doubted it would end there.
She would turn her anger on the helpless girl with him. Even if Takitsubo was a Level 4 who once stood up to the #2 to protect him, she wouldn't stand a chance in her current state.
Mugino seemed like someone who would lose all meaning in life once their revenge was successful. With the loss of that convenient motive, they would move on to the next in a never-ending cycle of bloodshed and hatred.
A person like that who had lived so long by staining their hands with blood would not know what to do if told to live peacefully.
Humans did not easily change. They would do everything in their power to cling to their old ways.
Most likely, she would create more victims.
Kinuhata had helped them escape. Who could say Mugino wouldn't hunt down and kill her when she returned to the city? Her former allies meant nothing to her. She might destroy anyone and anything who had the smallest connection to Hamazura Shiage if it meant continuing to pursue her revenge against him.
Would he really be able to live with himself if he let that happen? Only one person held the power to prevent more tragedies.
To be honest, he feared her more than anything in the world. She barely seemed human. But the smallest trace of regret remained in his heart.
Mugino looked at him an expression that was a mixture of sadness and anger. For the tiniest moment, he saw the face of a crying girl rather than that of a killer. But...
"Hamazura...you...I'll kill you, no matter what..."
Her voice had lost all of its strength and she could only drag her battered body along the ground. In her state, she had no more than two shots left.
"HAMAZURA!"
A thin line of white light that he recognized as Meltdowner appeared.
Why had they become enemies? The brief time he spent with ITEM was far from perfect, but there were moments when they supported one another. Even up until the battle with SCHOOL where everything had fallen apart, Mugino was someone he admired as a comrade.
It was tragic, but what he had to do did not change.
"Mugino...maybe in a less fucked-up world, you and I could have reached an understanding. But as long as one of us is alive, the other has to die, don't they?" he asked regretfully.
"You die first, Hamazura! Don't you fucking dare look down on me!" Mugino yelled. She put all of her remaining power into this one last shot. But she could barely aim in her state.
"Mugino...goodbye."
Bracing himself, he closed his eyes and pressed his shaking thumb down on the trigger of the assault rifle.
The sound of gunfire followed. The violent clash ended quickly.
The number of Level 5 espers in the world was reduced to six.
The white snow of the Russian countryside was painted with fresh red. The #4 was truly dead this time.
It didn't feel real. He almost wanted to walk over to her body to make sure she would not move again. Her desire to get back at him burned so intensely she had defied death twice just to be here in Russia.
"...It's over."
It wasn't pleasant. A sense of revulsion welled up within him, but he couldn't change what he had just done.
"Takitsubo, she...Mugino will never come after us again," he said to her. She looked away regretfully.
However, Mugino was only a symptom of the larger problem.
Academy City was their true enemy from the start. Having lost one of their most powerful espers, it was only a matter of time before a recovery team would arrive. And they would probably be from the dark side of the city, unlike the pilot who took out the Russian forces earlier.
Even the corpse of a Level 5 held immense research value, so the people at the top of Academy City were sure to retrieve her body from that Russian battlefield. After that, they would extract whatever they could from it just like they had done with #2.
Perhaps they would even cut out her brain and preserve it in a tube in order to keep her thought functions alive and continuously reproduce her unique power. He did not doubt the ability of Academy City's medical science to do just that.
But he could no longer worry about someone who was gone.
He and Takitsubo needed to get away from here as quickly as possible. And they still needed something with which to negotiate their freedom. The fight wasn't over yet.
This was written as a what-if scenario assuming Hamazura had reacted realistically when confronted with the chance to kill Mugino. I know the purpose of that scene was to show the change in his nature and his willingness to forgive, but his reasoning for saving her seemed as though he was lying to himself, given that he was perfectly willing to kill her prior to WW3.
Toaru Majutsu no Index belongs to Kazuma Kamachi/Kadokawa.