The streets of Queens were bathed in the golden glow of the setting sun, stretching two figures out into long, thin shadows.
"Hey, I'm talking to you. Can you stop walking with your head down all the time? You won't even see a pothole in front of you." Misaka Mikoto turned her head, looking at the dejected Peter Parker beside her.
Ever since that night, the boy had been like this, resembling a puppy drenched in the rain.
"Oh... sorry." Peter lifted his head, his eyes flickering away.
Mikoto sighed, simply stopped walking, put her hands on her hips, and said in an unquestionable tone:
"Listen, Peter. Your uncle is fine, and that's enough. You don't need to keep wearing that 'end of the World' expression; it's really ruining my mood on my first day coming home from school."
Peter opened his mouth, but in the end, he only nodded.
He couldn't tell her that if it weren't for her, Uncle Ben might very well have lost his life because of his own selfish thought. This heavy sense of guilt pressed on his heart like a giant boulder.
And the girl before him—the more she acted nonchalant, the more it highlighted his own insignificance and irresponsibility.
The two walked the rest of the way in silence and pushed open the front door.
"Aunt May, Uncle Ben, we're home!" Peter called out listlessly.
"Mikoto, Peter, you're back from school? Hurry up and wash your hands for dinner! I made your favorite chicken wraps tonight!" Aunt May's warm voice came from the kitchen, accompanied by the enticing aroma of food.
At the dining table, warm yellow light spilled onto everyone's faces. Uncle Ben sliced the chicken wraps on his plate, looked up at Mikoto, and offered a gentle smile.
"Mikoto, how was your first day at Midtown High? Are you getting used to it? Did anyone bully you?"
"It's okay," Mikoto replied, her mouth stuffed with food, muffled. "It's much easier than the curriculum in Japan, and the classmates are quite friendly."
She was telling the truth. With her academic prowess at Tokiwadai, the curriculum at Midtown High was practically child's play. She even had the leisure time in class to calculate the optimal firing angle and air resistance for her Railgun.
Hearing this answer, Uncle Ben and Aunt May exchanged a look and both smiled with relief.
The reason Mikoto was able to sit here so calmly, and even go to school, all started from that night half a month ago...
"Bang!"
That was the last sound in Misaka Mikoto's mind—the deafening noise made when her bubble-socked foot made intimate contact with that stubborn vending machine in Academy City.
But the next second, that familiar sound of metal caving in disappeared.
In its place were deafening sirens and a cacophony of human voices mixed with countless languages.
Mikoto snapped her eyes open, looking completely bewildered.
She found herself standing in the middle of an incredibly wide street, surrounded by skyscrapers that towered into the clouds. Massive electronic billboards hung on the walls, their glaring light pollution making her eyes ache.
Blond-haired, blue-eyed white people, dark-skinned black people—crowds of every skin color surged past her like a tide, everyone in a hurry.
This was not Tokyo, Japan, and certainly not the Academy City she was familiar with.
"What on earth..."
Her brown short hair was a bit messy from the wind. Mikoto used one hand to neaten her hair while her other hand subconsciously reached into the pocket of her middle school uniform, only to touch a cold, hard game coin.
This was her trump card, the dedicated ammunition for her "Railgun."
A trace of blue-white electric arc flashed quietly across her bangs, then instantly vanished.
This was a precursor to her power going out of control, a sign of extreme agitation.
She could feel the city's power grid like a boundless, giant web. Countless unfamiliar electrical signals surged crazily within her "electromagnetic induction" perception—muddled and chaotic, making her extremely uncomfortable.
What on earth happened? A kidnapping? Or a prank by some Academy City esper?
Just as she looked around in confusion, a giant screen on the outer wall of a shopping mall at the street corner caught her attention.
On the screen, a blond-haired, blue-eyed anchorwoman was broadcasting the news in fluent English:
"...Three months have passed since the Battle of New York. Stark Industries announced today that it will take full responsibility for the post-war reconstruction of Manhattan. Public discussion regarding the superhero 'Avengers' remains as heated as ever..."
The news footage switched, and photo after photo flashed by. A man in a red and blue uniform holding a shield, a blond, muscular man wearing a red cape and holding a war hammer, and another—a figure in iron armor flying through the air.
Mikoto's pupils contracted sharply.
What is all this? A movie trailer?
What shocked her even more was the time and location displayed in the bottom right corner of the screen.
[New York, August 3, 2012, 20:05]
"2012...?" Mikoto's lips trembled slightly; she could hardly believe her eyes.
She remembered clearly that the day she kicked the vending machine was April 5, 2011!
Not only was the time off by over a year, but the location had also teleported from Tokyo to New York!
To verify that worst-case scenario, she rushed into the mall, found an Apple store, and located a demo computer with internet access.
Opening the browser, she tremblingly typed "Japan Tokyo — Academy City" into the search box.
[No search results.]
"You've got to be kidding me... Did I really time-travel? Is this the Vending Machine God's punishment for me? I'll never kick a vending machine again, Gomen nasai!"
Mikoto wanted to cry but had no tears; all her strength seemed to have been drained away.
She slumped powerlessly against the chair, her hands uncontrollably grabbing at her hair, trying to use pain to prove that this was just an absurd nightmare.
This was not her World.
She couldn't go back.
"Goodbye, Kuroko, Uiharu, Saten, Shokuhou with that embarrassing figure, my friend Sisters, and... that idiot... No, no! This isn't the time to think about these things. Mikoto, you need to pull yourself together!"
Mikoto shook her head, driving the image of that someone out of her mind.
"You are an Academy City Level 5 esper! Are you really going to be afraid of a mere 'mortal' World? I will work hard, I will strive! I will carve out a place for myself on American soil!"
Mikoto was indeed a strong-willed person; in just a few moments, she had picked herself back up.
In this strange World, she was only fourteen, penniless, without a single acquaintance, just a cute middle school girl who looked 'harmless to humans and animals.'
Her only "asset" was that cold game coin in her pocket.
"Alright, Misaka Mikoto, battle start!"
After pumping herself up, Mikoto put her hands on her hips, took a deep breath, left her seat, and marched out of the mall with high spirits.
"First, step one, the foundation of survival—find a place to sleep."
She muttered to herself, as if giving herself a mission directive.
"Hotels, inns... these all require money."
"Where's my money?" She patted her pockets, pulled out that lonely game coin, and tossed it between her fingertips.
"One game coin, great. I bet it can't even buy a can of cola from that vending machine over there."
Her gaze subconsciously flicked toward the vending machine at the street corner, and her right foot lifted slightly by instinct.
"No! Misaka Mikoto! You swore!"
She quickly slapped her cheeks, nipping the dangerous thought in the bud.
"You need to be a civilized person; you can't use violence to solve problems anymore—at least, not against vending machines."
She started walking, wandering aimlessly through the streets of New York.
Everywhere around her were scaffolds and huge green dust-protection nets. The arms of large cranes moved slowly in the air, emitting a dull roar.
A giant billboard had been torn in half, revealing the blackened wall behind it, and several steel bars poked toward the sky, twisted like the ribs of a monster.
"The news said... 'post-war reconstruction'?"
"Stark Industries... sounds like a very wealthy company."
"What kind of 'battle' could possibly beat a city into this state?"
She looked up at a huge gap on the side of a building; the metal and concrete at the edges showed clear signs of high-temperature melting.
"This isn't something ordinary bombs could do."
"That blond brute with the hammer, and that tin man... This World seems even more outrageous than I imagined."
"Fine, this World isn't a World for 'mortals,' which just increased the difficulty of my survival! So happy... as if!"
"Grrr..."
An ill-timed sound came from her stomach.
The aroma from a hot dog stand on the street seemed to have hooks, desperately trying to burrow into her nose.
"Damn it... my stomach actually betrayed me..."
Mikoto clutched her stomach, her expression a bit helpless.
"Calm down, calm down! The urgent priority is money! Money! And it's still money!"
"How do normal people make money again? Part-time job?"
She looked down at her Tokiwadai Middle School uniform.
"A minor who looks only sixteen, with no identification—who would hire me?"
"Go ask for help? 'Hello, Mr. Police Officer, I'm actually an esper from another World; can you give me some money to eat and stay at a hotel?'"
"Or 'Hey, who's the best fighter in your taekwondo gym? I want to take on ten of you! No, wait, I'm here to apply for a coaching position. Don't look at me because I'm small; I can actually fight really well (and I have to use an extremely arrogant expression)'... I don't want to be locked up as a mental patient!"
After throwing a helpless tantrum, Mikoto recognized reality, scratched her hair in frustration, and the bangs on her forehead began to flicker with weak electric sparks again.