The World of "A Certain Magical Index"
The entire world suddenly experienced a massive reduction in energy, and a group of Magic Gods disintegrated into dust before they could even react.
A certain seductive big sister, dressed in denim shorts with one leg cut off, was in her usual sparring session with a delinquent boy dressed as a red-haired priest.
"Seven Flashes!"
She launched her attack, but all of a sudden, she felt all of her energy drain from her body.
The steel wires she had slashed out went berserk, binding her in a Shibari-style restraint. Her already voluptuous figure became even more alluring under this provocative bondage.
The delinquent priest facing her was so shocked he dropped the cigarette from his mouth.
"Hey, hey! Big sis, even if you're going easy on me, this is way too obvious."
'No! It's not like that!'
The seductive big sister wanted to speak, but the steel wires were tied so perfectly that, though she could breathe, she couldn't speak—only managing muffled sounds.
Her overly suggestive posture made her face flush with embarrassment.
The delinquent priest completely misunderstood, thinking his big sister was encouraging him, and quickly waved his hands.
"Okay, okay, I get it."
He struck a pose, but all he managed to produce was a tiny flame the size of a fingertip.
The scene became extremely awkward.
Meanwhile, in a quiet alley, a certain albino boy walked along.
On a rooftop 500 meters away, a tea-haired girl wearing military-grade night vision goggles aimed an anti-materiel sniper rifle, longer than she was tall, at the albino boy's head.
"Time: 18:00. The 10,086th experiment begins," Misaka No. 10,086 coldly stated.
The tea-haired girl muttered something incomprehensible and pulled the trigger.
Bang!
With a loud bang, the massive bullet shot straight toward the target's head.
Splat!
Without a sound, the albino boy's head exploded like a watermelon, splattering red and white matter across the alley.
The tea-haired girl was stunned, though her expressionless face betrayed no emotion.
"Accelerator has been killed. The 10,086th experiment has failed," Misaka said, dazed.
In a cozy student dormitory a few kilometers away, a girl identical to the tea-haired sniper but with livelier eyes was desperately trying to shake off the "octopus" wrapped around her.
For some reason, her usually reliable "100,000 Volts" only produced a few sparks.
Her junior, mistakenly thinking she was playing hard to get, excitedly pounced on her.
"Such misfortune!"
The tea-haired girl shouted with frustration, echoing the catchphrase of a certain spiky-haired boy.
Across Academy City, in a plain student dormitory, a certain spiky-haired boy sat at home watching TV.
Suddenly, his eyes widened as he stared at the screen, his hands trembling as he pulled a beautifully printed slip of paper from his pocket.
It was a lottery ticket.
With a trembling finger, he pointed at the TV, his face filled with disbelief.
Earlier today, the supermarket he frequented was running a promotion: spend a certain amount, get a free lottery ticket.
Having never won even a single yen in his life, the boy had casually stuffed the ticket into his pocket as if it were trash.
Who would've thought...
"I won... I won!? I hit the jackpot!? I won 100 million yen!!!"
As if he had been saving up his luck from birth, fortune finally smiled upon him!
"So lucky!"
The spiky-haired boy shouted to the sky. Then, to the bewilderment of the silver-haired nun beside him, he picked her up by the arms and spun her around.
The silver-haired nun, initially confused, quickly regained her senses and became furious.
"Touma!!!"
A blood-curdling scream came from the dormitory, followed by the sounds of biting and chewing...
As energy levels across the world of "A Certain Magical Index" sharply declined, both the magic factions and Academy City gradually withdrew from the stage.
Academy City managed to hold on, barely, maintaining its influence through technology and strategic exchanges of interests.
The magic factions, especially the once-dominant Roman Catholic Church, became easy prey for the nations they had once suppressed.
The vast Christian Church was quickly dismantled, with its wealth and resources seized by nation-states.
Once influential, the Church was now a shadow of its former self.
Thus, the world of "A Certain Magical Index" entered a peculiar form of peace.
Similarly, in the world of "One Piece," with the loss of Devil Fruits, Haki, and the Six Powers, battles at sea shifted from contests of individual strength to clashes between warships.
With their overwhelming technological advantage and numbers, the Navy annihilated the Yonko and over 90% of the pirates, ushering in a temporary era of peace.
A certain straw-hat boy was finally captured by his grandfather and became an honorable navy officer. Thanks to the protagonist's incredible luck, he eventually rose to the rank of Fleet Admiral.
How joyous!
...
Ryou had no idea that his actions had caused such a massive impact on both worlds.
After absorbing the world essence of both worlds, he was immediately dragged to the training ground by Scathach for a brutal sparring session.
Ryou initially thought that with the Time Gem in his possession and his unfairly powerful World Source skills, he could at least glimpse a chance of victory.
Reality proved otherwise.
Shishou is still Shishou.
The nerfed Time Gem was completely useless against Scathach's skill and the World Separation.
Though Ryou had an advantage in attributes, he still fell to Scathach's superior combat experience and techniques.
So, Ryou's dream of defeating Scathach remained distant.
Perhaps he would only have a chance to reach Scathach's level after collecting all six Root Gems and wielding them with his power.
Suddenly, Ryou realized he was starting to resemble a certain purple-skinned villain.
Hopefully, he wouldn't end up like that villain—snapping his fingers to wipe out half of all life, yet still unable to win.
Thinking of the villain's tragic love story with the goddess of Death, Ryou felt a headache coming on.
Now that he thought about it, Scathach's personality did resemble lady Death...
Could he be that unlucky?
Ryou figured he would just have to take things one step at a time.
Thanks to his bizarre and powerful abilities, Ryou temporarily satisfied Scathach's thirst for battle.
Thus, Scathach generously let him off the hook.
After taking a day off, Ryou returned to his intense training regimen.
Absorbing the World Source caused his attributes to skyrocket, but it also introduced significant risks.
It was like a sniper rifle—its power in the hands of a veteran sniper is vastly different than in the hands of an ordinary person.
Before entering the next world, Ryou needed to work hard to familiarize himself with his newfound strength.
Every time a basic attribute increased by a major grade, the effects were drastically different. Especially after reaching Grade C, each improvement brought a monumental transformation.
Each increase in grade represented a tenfold boost from the previous level!
It's no exaggeration to say that Ryou now possessed the strength of a humanoid dragon.
He had only one month to adapt to a power ten times greater than before.
To achieve this, Ryou even went to Scathach for some abuse—I mean, for help.
Naturally, Scathach was more than happy to oblige; nothing was more enjoyable than training (torturing) a disciple.
After twenty days of relentless torment, Ryou finally gained preliminary control over his vastly increased power.
At the very least, he could now drink from a glass of water without accidentally crushing it.
At this point, Ryou received a notification from the system: the next world he would enter was Re:Zero − Starting Life in Another World Novel.
.
After some thought, Ryou had Semiramis summoned back from the world of Danmachi.
"Ara~ Has my lord finally thought of bestowing his favor upon me~? As expected, no one wants an old, faded woman like me~"
Semiramis's first words upon seeing Ryou almost made him spit out blood.
To make matters worse, he immediately felt several pairs of murderous eyes glaring at him from behind.
Realizing things were about to turn into a true battlefield of love, Ryou quickly explained the reason for summoning her.
After hearing his explanation, Semiramis's eyes narrowed into slits.
"What an interesting task. I suppose I'll accept it, though it's beneath me."
"Good..."
Ryou wiped away imaginary cold sweat from his forehead.
Then he turned to another person.
"Ana, you're coming with me too."
"Eh? Me?"
Anastasia was initially surprised, then overjoyed.
Ryou nodded.
"Yes, I want you to meet someone..."
Before he could finish, someone muttered something, which immediately resonated with the other women.
"Master, that person is a girl, right?"
"Of course! When have you ever seen our master show interest in a man?"
"Good point."
As they all nodded in unison, Ryou's face turned awkward.
"Hey! Enough of that!"
After some playful banter, Ryou, Semiramis, and Anastasia set off on their journey.
Once they left, the other girls returned to their tasks.
...
In a flash of light, Ryou, Semiramis, and Anastasia found themselves in a European-style alley.
"You brat, are you looking down on us?!"
"Let's see if you don't die today!"
Before Ryou could fully take in his surroundings, he noticed three thugs beating up a young man in a tracksuit not far away.
Ryou was stunned—wasn't this the opening scene of Re:Zero?
The young man in the tracksuit, which looked completely out of place in this world, was none other than the protagonist, Natsuki Subaru.
As for the three thugs—one tall, one short, and one fat, with the leader resembling a budget version of Accelerator—they were the city's small-time punks.
At that moment, the budget Accelerator seemed to decide that kicking Subaru wasn't satisfying enough. His intentions turning sinister, he pulled out a gleaming knife and aimed for Subaru's kidney.
"Die, kid!"
Slash!
With a sickening sound of metal piercing flesh, blood splattered everywhere.
The intense pain, anger, hatred, and despair twisted Subaru's face into a grimace.
A stab to the kidney wouldn't kill instantly; Subaru slumped against the wall, clutching his wound with one hand while reaching forward with the other as if grasping for a lifeline.
At that moment, he saw Ryou and the others not far away and instinctively reached out to them, his face pleading.
Seeing that there were others present, the trio of punks realized they were in over their heads.
"Damn it! Don't get involved!"
"What are you looking at? Never seen a murder before?"
"Keep staring, and we'll kill you too!"
The three thugs barked half-hearted threats and quickly fled in a panic.
Semiramis crossed her arms and looked at the bloody scene with indifference, her gaze shifting between Natsuki Subaru and Ryou as if waiting for him to make a decision.
Anastasia, on the other hand, showed a hint of compassion on her otherwise icy face.
"Ryou-sama…"
Ryou raised his hand, stopping Anastasia from saying anything further, and observed Subaru, whose life was slipping away.
He was waiting for a specific event.
This had to do with the unique nature of this world.
In this world, there were seven Witches named after the Deadly Sins.
It was said that an eighth witch, the Witch of Vainglory—Pandora—would appear later, and she seemed to be the mastermind behind everything.
As a fan of the anime, Ryou didn't know much about the light novels or manga.
So, he wasn't too familiar with that.
Even if he knew what happened later, he wouldn't be too surprised.
So, it's not surprising at all if seven Deadly Sin Witches turn out to be eight.
It's just the trend nowadays.
Anyway, four hundred years ago, the Witch of Envy, Satella, suddenly went berserk, killed the other six witches in one go, and consumed half of the world.
Honestly, the Gaia of this world is not to be trifled with—it got eaten just like that.
Then, Satella was sealed by the Divine Dragon, the first Sword Saint, and the Sage.
Four hundred years passed in the blink of an eye, and a Japanese high school student named Natsuki Subaru was summoned to this world. He was granted the bug-like ability of "Return by Death" by the sealed Witch of Envy.
"Return by Death," as the name suggests, allows Subaru to return to a specific point in time before his death, much like reloading a save in a game.
Moreover, according to rumors, Subaru is the reincarnation of the Sage from four hundred years ago. And this Sage supposedly had a romantic relationship with the Witch of Envy, Satella.
This rumor is quite plausible.
After all, why would a witch, already mad, grant such a god-tier immortality buff to some random Japanese high school student from another world?
And every time Subaru experiences "Return by Death" and is enshrouded in black mist, Satella, hidden within it, sometimes whispers words of love to him.
If there wasn't something between them, who would believe it?
And what Ryou was waiting for was exactly this—the moment Subaru would experience "Return by Death."