There are limits to what information sight alone can convey.
Even with all their senses combined, humans only manage to extend their perception by a pitiful margin. Ability users might have it slightly better, but they still face enormous constraints.
Though she appeared relatively calm, lounging on the sofa in the Judgment branch office, Natsume Sonoko's thoughts were anything but restrained.
Her mind's eye flickered between the ordinary world and scenes of bizarre, kaleidoscopic strangeness.
In this world, broadly known as the Index universe, countless Phases were like paintbrushes dipped in pigment, freely daubing and smearing across the canvas of reality, rendering everything vividly colorful yet profoundly elusive.
Even Natsume-san had been touched by these marvels. By focusing on the Lightless Phase, she could shift her relative coordinates within it, altering her observational viewpoint.
It was somewhat akin to choosing which Phase to observe, though on a much smaller scale—freely moving within a single Phase.
If Natsume-san possessed the computational power to process all the information within a Phase, simply blanketing it with her perception would undoubtedly be easier.
"Found her. Feels like I've turned into a satellite."
"The computational load is still manageable. I could keep this up for over half an hour even without offloading the cost to Reiko-chan."
"Wow, she's already reached Tokyo? Mom works fast."
While making casual conversation with Saten-san, a certain bun-girl found her thoughts drifting, inexplicably observing her mother's journey home.
Though Natsume-san always kept a tight rein on her expressions, appearing unflappably serene, she cared deeply about her mother's return.
Fortunately, judging by the progress of her mother's negotiations with Academy City, she'd likely secure a pass by the start of October. Their efforts these past days hadn't been in vain.
She just hoped nothing… say, a world war… would crop up to complicate things in the meantime.
But really, what were the odds of it escalating to something as serious as a world war?
Hah, right? I'm overthinking things, the bun-girl thought with confident finality.
Shifting focus back to the Phase, she calculated that if she accounted for the car's speed and travel time, outlining a general perimeter outside Academy City, she was confident she could intercept her mother on her route home.
In practice, Natsume-san only needed to project her awareness continuously forward along a few major highways in the right direction; the aforementioned steps could be skipped entirely.
By blurring out unnecessary scenery and selectively ignoring useless information—microscopic details could be completely disregarded—she could scan vast areas with relative ease.
Furthermore, by incorporating air vibrations into her interpretive scope, Natsume-san could clearly decipher various sounds, eliminating any need to learn lip-reading.
However, her attention lingered on her mother for only a short while before she abruptly shifted her observational position.
She arrived at the base of the armed Skill-Out group.
With the emergence of this new perceptual ability, the means of information gathering that Natsume-san had previously lacked most finally experienced a revolutionary growth, patching up a key weakness beyond just electromagnetic barriers.
Matters that were difficult to investigate before could now be probed for the truth in her own unique way.
Or rather, from the moment Natsume-san realized she could do this, she had effectively become Academy City's most pervasive intelligence operative.
"With my new perception, maybe this whole situation doesn't need to be so troublesome."
Seeming to hit upon an idea, a thoughtful expression crossed Natsume-san's face. Her gaze grew distant, fixating on the Judgment armband on Uiharu's shoulder.
Hesitant thoughts still swirled in her mind. Expecting Natsume-san to become as diligent a Judgment member as Shirai-san was only possible in a world under an Infinite Tsukuyomi. Her brief, recently abandoned morning exercise routine was a perfect example.
Yet Natsume-san was inherently kind and conscientious, feeling she ought to do something. This meant the only thing truly holding her back was her long-ingrained habit of laziness.
In the end, it was a tug-of-war between her lazy nature and her own willpower; personal gain didn't really factor in.
Perhaps it would be more illustrative to picture a cartoon devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other.
Once she completely broke free from the shackles of her own habits and her environment, she'd likely be walking a path called 'Genuine Will.'
This time, however, the internal struggle seemed close to a resolution. Natsume-san appeared to have found a less troublesome method. If handled well, she might quickly resolve this so-called 'game.'
All sorts of ambiguous notions churned in her head. Natsume-san's eyes lit up slightly as she finally connected the dots.
That's right, why was I thinking of handling this nuisance alone? An esper's inflated self-confidence shouldn't be used for this.
No matter how strong Natsume-san was alone, how many people could she realistically handle? Especially with a persistent issue like student bullying.
So, if she just changed her approach, an indirect method might be more suitable.
This 'game' had already drawn the attention of both Judgment and Anti-Skill. The reason it remained unresolved was that the assaults kept happening in dark, hidden corners.
The victimized students either couldn't even file a report, or had no faith that Judgment or Anti-Skill could help them in time.
If the assailants left promptly, there was never any solid evidence.
It fell into a grey area: without a formal report or collected evidence, neither Anti-Skill nor Judgment could easily intervene. This held true for assaults involving both Level 0s and ability users.
Strictly speaking, the existence of armed Level 0 groups like Skill-Out also relied on this very grey area.
But Natsume-san realized she'd overlooked a crucial fact. While it seemed like a problem of perpetrators escaping punishment, the core issue was actually the deep-seated mistrust between Judgment and the Level 0s caught up in these incidents.
If both sides could cooperate, working closely together, the situation might have improved long ago.
Ultimately, 'Judgment-Civilian Cooperation' was the correct path to a solution.
No evidence? No problem. Catch them red-handed or just bring a camera. Entrapment wasn't a new tactic.
And to gain the trust of the Level 0s, using her perceptual ability to nab a few culprits first would be very effective. Once she had the cooperation of the Level 0s, it would make Shirai-san's job much easier, since she could arrive on the scene instantly.
Thinking this through, Natsume-san casually found a new task for a certain teleporter.
The armed Level 0 group she was currently observing seemed quite suitable for cooperating with Judgment.
Natsume-san found this group to be unexpectedly orderly. From their conversations, it seemed they'd even taken in several Level 0s who had been attacked.
"Uiharu-san, I've got an idea."
"If we cooperate with Skill-Out, we might be able to solve this 'game' problem."
"Oh, and those spherical aerial cameras we used during the Daihaseisai."
Snapping back to reality, Natsume-san stood up with a start, her expression serious and unusually animated. She blinked, meeting the bewildered gazes of the two girls from Sakugawa Middle School.
Really, there was no need to force herself. If it was a Judgment group activity, she was more than happy to participate in this kind of team effort.
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T/N: I have a Patreon! While it may seem empty as of now, webnovel will get 3 Chapters Every Day, and advanced chapters will be uploaded on Patreon.
It may not seem worth it now, but maybe in the future. Who knows!
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If you guys wanna check it out.