I changed the title, only because I didn't want to deal with more nitpicks about it in the reviews. I also slightly edited the first few chapters so the story could maintain its stability. If it's still a bit unstable and I forgot to edit something in the first few chapters, just give me a quick reminder. Thank you!

I didn't revise this chapter as much, so let me know if anything is off or hard to understand.

Anyway, let's get started.

Mikoto walked fiercely into her next target. She has recently been wrecking and destroying data into her faculty in an attempt to put an end to the horrible project. I sowed the seeds. I'll clean up the mess myself, only 3 more to go, including this one. She thought in her head.

Every laboratory she has entered has been completely abandoned and unguarded, they weren't all that hard to destroy. Trying to identify each lab was a little more of a challenge, but Mikoto's plan went smoothly. She remembered Kuroko's concerned and suspicious look every time she would leave her dorm during the evening, but reminded herself that there may be another "experiment" going on.

Mikoto snuck through the ominous place, keeping the layout of the place in her head. She was going to have to run past a storage place, take a left through the hallway, and finally take a right to reach the data bank.

As she snuck through the window of the empty building, she felt a singular person's presence in the lab. This figure didn't seem to be moving, only standing still in a singular spot in the middle of the storage room.

Mikoto wanted to avoid this person. He was probably some janitor working overnight, and she didn't want to resort to harming others. However, Mikoto realized there was no other path she could take through the building. She thought about breaking through a wall, going straight into the databank, but realized that if this man was only a janitor. He probably wouldn't survive the arson.

Mikoto inhaled deeply, held her cap down low, and opened the door. "This is a warning! Evacuate the...-" Mikoto paused.

A person with a familiar mask and cape slowly looked up from where she was looking, and stared at Mikoto. The storage room looked surprisingly empty, but Mikoto realized the huge metal railcars were squished to one side of the place, leaving a ton of empty space between the two people in the faculty. There were only several hanging cheap light bulbs in the warehouse illuminating the place. There were no windows. The place looked like a true warehouse.

"Building." Mikoto said, finishing her statement. It didn't take long for Mikoto to figure out why Zero was in the faculty. "Are you going to get in my way?" Mikoto demanded.

Zero only drew a pistol in response.

Mikoto took another deep breath and shouted. "You're the 6th ranked, and I'm the 3rd ranked. That gun won't do any good against me either. You should just get out of my way if you don't want to get hurt."

Mikoto suddenly stopped a bullet coming her way using her electromagnetism. "So that's how it is." She said with a groan.

She lifted several pieces of metal that make up the floor and sent them all at once to Zero. She couldn't afford to go easy on a level 5, even if he was the 6th ranked.

But the projectiles meant nothing to the esper. A smooth-looking iceberg emerged behind, taking a unique form of an umbrella. The ice usually shouldn't withstand metal, but as the heavy projectiles break the ice, the ice reforms again, effectively encasing the projectiles Mikoto sent in ice.

Mikoto flinched and readied herself. She managed to neutralize all the attacks Mikoto made with a wave of a finger. Zero ran straight for Mikoto, making weaves and turns to make it harder for Mikoto to land a shot.

Despite Zero's unpredictable movements, Mikoto threw more steel to keep the guard distracted. However, Zero dodged every single one of them, and ended up in Mikoto's face. Mikoto quickly reacted by pulling herself backwards using her magnetism. She felt her back against the heavy metal door and saw a fireball hurled in her face.

Mikoto dealt with many pyrokinetics before, so she simply unfolded the floor even more to act as a shield. What Mikoto didn't expect however, was that the fireball melted straight through the "shield" and almost would've melted her face if she wasn't on guard.

Mikoto felt an extreme heat zip by as she sidestepped. She saw two glowing orange holes both on the floor and the wall behind herself.

She got rid of all obstacles so I would have nothing to use against her!

Mikoto sprinted to the side, and stuck her shoes onto the adjacent wall. Zero fired several shots as Mikoto sprinted on the wall towards next room, hoping that they could fight in a place where she had the upper hand.

But of course, the masked figure wouldn't allow that. Ice grew in Mikoto's way like a crystal recorded in time-lapse, preventing Mikoto from walking further on the wall. Mikoto put her arm up so she could stand on the ceiling, but she noticed the ceiling change from a shiny grey to a piercing white. She looked down at her feet to notice the same thing. To avoid touching the ice, Mikoto cut off the electric current to let go of the wall.

As she fell to the floor, she felt a sudden clean blow to the back of her head.

This made Mikoto go off balance, falling onto her side. She ended up hitting her head onto the hard, metal floor. Mikoto felt her head spin as she struggled to get up. Zero's footsteps felt amplified, with the eerie taps echoing through the storage room. Before she knew it, Zero was right in front of her. Now that Mikoto was on the ground, the masked figure looked even more menacing and ominous. Zero pulled out a long looking knife and began to put a single knee to the ground.

Damn it! She froze the wall and ceiling to lure me out, then kicked me! She had an actual plan! It's like she already knew me!

Mikoto tried to pull herself up, but her body won't move. It had to take a few more seconds before Mikoto could move her fingers.

Those seconds felt like a solid minute.

Once Mikoto could finally move, the dagger came for her throat. Mikoto used her magnetism to fling the dagger out of Zero's hands.

Dumbstruck, Zero jumped backwards and pulled out the gun. However, Mikoto used her magnetism once more to pull the gun out of Zero's hands. Mikoto caught the gun with her right hand and fired. She felt her wrist vibrate violently alongside her head.

Mikoto gripped her wrist from the recoil.

This is what shooting a gun feels like? Why didn't I feel this before?

As her pounding headache in her head began to fade, she finally pieced together what she had done. She had shot someone. She looked up in horror to find a shattered mask on the ground, and Zero pressing her own hand into her face. Tiny drops of blood fell and black hair emerged from the hood. Zero smiled lightly, which contradicted the situation she was in. She slowly pulled out the hood that was hiding her eyes.

Mikoto was speechless to see Zero's identity.

She couldn't believe it. She heavily considered what she was seeing was an illusion, but as many times as she blinked, the face she was seeing didn't change.

"I guess I deserved that, huh?" Emilia said in a distant voice. The blood flow in her forehead began to slow down.

Mikoto only said a single word. "Why?"

Emilia stayed silent. She didn't seem to mind being shot in the head at all, and Mikoto didn't question how she was alive in the first place.

"Why are you doing this? Did you hate me that much? Did you enjoy seeing me die over and over again!?" Mikoto shouted in fury.

"I can't believe I got tricked so easily! You're a psychopath who betrays their friends without a second thought!" Mikoto continued.

Emilia made a fist and clenched it.

"What about those three kids in your phone wallpaper? Did you kill them too?" She demanded.

Emillia winced. She began to grip her fist tighter.

"You bitch!" Mikoto finished.

"What are you talking about?" Emilia said. She stared Mikoto straight in the eyes.

Mikoto never felt so much Fury and confusion in just someone's expression. She never stopped to consider Emilia's point of view.

Emilia didn't say anything. She only created an ice ramp where the dagger was. The dagger slid through the ice and ended up at Emilia's toes. She slowly bent over to pick it up. As soon as she did. The lightbulbs hanging from the ceiling began to freeze up and shatter.

The orange glow Emilia made on the floor and wall earlier began to fade, leaving the room pitch black.

Mikoto stood up and went on guard. She could detect Emilia's location using her ability, but it became harder to keep track of as soon as Emilia began to move.

It was the first time, for a while, where Mikoto was truly frightened.

Mikoto stood still. She roughly remembered where the exit is supposed to be. It was on her left. She slowly walked forward, completely blind.

She immediately ducked to dodge a few bullets coming from the darkness. Emilia knew her location. Mikoto knew this wasn't good. She ran forward a couple more steps until she calculated that she should be in the center of the room. She turned to her left so she could run to the exit, but she felt someone's presence behind her. She turned around to blindly punch whatever was there.

Mikoto hit something. But suddenly she felt an extreme pain in her fist and pulled it out to inspect it. Her knuckles had it's skin peeled off, freezing. What she had hit was an ice statue.

Tired of this, she tried powering up the light bulbs with her ability, but it was no use. The bulbs were broken beyond repair. She emitted as much electricity as possible to light up the huge room for only a few seconds. She glanced around the room to find Emilia standing on top of one of the huge metal boxes that were in the corner.

As the light went out again, Mikoto fired a bolt towards Emilia, but she presumably dodged it, since nothing happened. Mikoto could roughly notice that Emilia jumped off her high ground, and was on her right.

She's going to dodge again if I attack. If I just wait for the right moment…

Mikoto suddenly felt Emilia run straight towards her. Then, Mikoto threw a chunk of steel straight at Emilia. Emilia slid underneath to dodge the projectile, but the chunk ended up busting open the wall. The moonlight shined through the wall, lighting up the room.

Emilia continued to run at Mikoto and instead of hitting her, she grabbed her wrist. Mikoto only felt a slight shove towards the hole she made.

But suddenly, Mikoto began to accelerate abnormally towards the wall. She enlarged the hole with her ability just as she got through. She hit the ground and found herself in a neighborhood street. She stood up and turned around to see Emilia come out the faculty.

To make up for the lack of metal in the area, Mikoto lifted the iron sand on the rural looking road, creating a pitch black Japanese-style katana.

In response, Emilia pulled out her dagger. The dagger began to extend with ice, almost like an icicle. The icicle took the shape of a rapier, with intimidating icy air rising from the sword.

Mikoto extended the sword to come for Emilia. She didn't want to come anywhere near the rapier, the peeled off skin in her knuckles was painful enough. But Emilia dodged to the side with her sword in hand and went for Mikoto's left flank. Mikoto's plan to keep her distance failed completely.

Emilia swung the rapier at Mikoto. She used her katana to block the hit, but the iron sand cut straight through the ice. Emilia jumped back as her sword began to regenerate it's length.

My katana is better!

Mikoto went for Emilia this time, her sword in her right hand. The blades danced around in the middle of the night, with the moonlight shining.

It was not like your everyday sword fight. The swords never clashed at all. It was only swinging and dodging.

Mikoto mostly used her katana to defend. She had the advantage, since her sword is far more durable than the rapier. However, Emilia was far more proficient with her sword, and Mikoto found dodging the tip of the rapier much more difficult than it seemed to be.

Mikoto finally decided to go on the offensive and slashed at Emilia's neck. Emilia immediately ducked and swept Mikoto's legs. Mikoto tripped and fell, and Emilia kicked Mikoto midair. Mikoto fell to the ground, with some additional distance between the two level 5s. She immediately regretted trying to attack.

I can come up with a combo of my own too!

Mikoto pulled herself up and took a few steps back. She readied her sword and then suddenly threw her katana at Emillia. Knowing that the iron sand is under Mikoto's control, Emillia made an ice wall to block the sword.

Mikoto pulled out a coin with her left hand and as soon as she did, Emilia thickened the wall. If she left the road, it'll leave her wide open. Emillia ran back, continuing to thicken the ice wall.

Then Mikoto fired her Railgun.

The coin flew, digging straight into the ice like it's nothing. Emillia, who was off guard, instinctively blocked the beam with her sword as soon as it came for her. The rapier broke, and so did the dagger. However, Emilia managed to avoid the beam anyway with the little time she bought for herself.

She took a sigh of relief and looked up to see another coin onto Mikoto's right, bleeding hand.

Mikoto fired her second Railgun, hitting Emilia directly.

With a sigh of relief, Mikoto walked around the huge layers of ice and finally saw Emillia on the ground. She picked up scrap of metal that was conveniently on the ground and rolled Emillia onto it. She needed answers.

"Amazing. Your friend here managed to stop a bullet in her head before it managed to touch the frontal lobe." A frog-faced doctor said. "I'm not sure if it's her ability or if she just has the world's thickest skull."

"Is she going to be fine, Dr. Gekota?" Mikoto asked.

"Of course."

Mikoto eventually brought Emillia to the nearest hospital, and the only doctor who happened to be awake in the middle of the night was the Heaven Canceller.

"She's probably going to wake up 12 hours from now. Though your friend might have a broken rib or two. You can go home to sleep now."

"No, I'll stay."